Chronicles of the Fall: Reason Out to Lunch
by midori Haru
Summary: Apparently traveling between times can be hazardous to your psychological and physical health, who knew? And still those shards need collecting!
1. Perversity on Parade

Hurray! Part two! WE are now going to start figuring out what Aki now looks like. And this chapter should be really fun because Shippou and Miroku are in it. should be interesting, especially since Shippou hasn't seen Aki since before that evil witch broke Aki's cover spell. I'm so demented. Hanako shows up again too! And I know at least a couple people really liked her!But seriuosly, where the hell do I come up with these chapter titles from anyway?

All questions must be submitted in writing. And I know you can do it. I've already had one person accomplish it!

The Inuyasha cast and natural habitat have been relocated to my basement while developers scope out the studio where they used to live. Now I have unlimited acesss to them 24-7. Wee! This should be fun.

**Perversity on Parade**

Waiting, for anything, is not a lot of fun. IT is always particularly tiresome and can often be slightly nerve-wracking. The experience of waiting is a part of life and everyone will suffer through it at least half a dozen times in their life and quite likely more than that.

There are some who argue that life is just a collection of waiting periods. We wait to be born. We wait to grow up. We wait to grow old and be taken care of by our family. WE wait to die. Though finding people who actually wait for the last two is difficult. And it is quite hard to believe that we're aware enough before birth to be awaiting the event, but others disagree as it is in the nature of people to disagree. It still does not negate the fact that waiting, in and of itself, is an unpleasant occupation.

Especially when you're waiting for someone to do something.

"When's Kagome coming back?" Shippou asked for the hundredth time in that voice reserved for children that are impatiently waiting for something they really want. Most any parent could identify it after having taken a moderately long car ride.

Thus it was a good measure of Miroku's monkly mettle when he forbore taking violent measures against the kit upon hearing that same question once again. "Soon Shippou," he replied gently after counting to ten, repeatedly. "Kagome-sama said she would come back today. It takes some time to collect her supplies and pack them for travel." The monk recited his answer mechanically with an internal sigh. "After all, she had not thought to be able to come through the well again until you helped her yesterday. She had to go straighten her personal affairs and round up her things." Miroku barely managed to finish his answer when his brain followed the wonderful path of what those 'personal _affairs_' could be.

Shippou heaved a big sigh. He wished Kagome was here. He wondered what she was doing. Maybe she was getting smothered in hugs from her mother. The kit whined enviously. He wished Kagome was here to smother _him_ with hugs! Kagome gave the best hugs and she'd promised to bring him something sweet this time. And a surprise.

Shippou loved surprises. He couldn't wait! Perhaps the surprise would be a new toy. He hoped it wasn't something too girly. Maybe it was something to eat, besides the sweets Kagome's promised. Maybe it was some magical thing from Kagome's time. Yeah! That would be so awesome!

He glanced at the well, still nothing. Shippou heaved another big sigh. "When's Kagome coming back?" One hundred and one.

Miroku's eyebrow twitched, the counting was no longer working. The monk had finally had enough. With flames of irritation in his eyes he growled Shippou's name in warning before lunging after the quickly fleeing kitsune.

It was just as Miroku was triumphantly laying hands on the demented child that there came movement from the well. "Kagome?" Shippou asked. All of his previous terror evaporated instantly. All was right in the world if Kagome was back.

But the figure climbing out of the well wasn't Kagome. Hell the person climbing over the wooden rim wasn't even human, and she sure wasn't Inuyasha.

Shippou and Miroku were only expecting those two to come out of the well, not this stranger. As far as they knew only Inuyasha and Kagome could go through the well. What exactly was going on here?

In any case, caution before curiosity. "Stay back Youkai!" Miroku assumed a defensive stance with Shippou behind him. Kagome would kill him if he allowed anything to happen to the kit.

Unfortunately, Shippou wasn't going to have any of that protecting stuff. He wanted to know who the stranger was and why she seemed so familiar.

Upon hearing Miroku's warning, the female's head snapped up to look on him with startled green eyes. She raised an eyebrow and smiled at them carefully, still getting used to some of her changes. Aki had managed to grow skilled enough with her illusions to hide some of her new attributes, but others were just more stubborn.

Her hair was lighter than it had been before she met the witch, but not as light as it was without her illusions. Her talons were now just clawed fingers. Aki's ears were back where they belonged but still pointed despite her efforts to the contrary. Her eyes refused to go back. Her height was moderately reduced, but not enough to put her back to the height she used to be.

At this point she was just incredibly thankful her wings and tail were gone. It was a lot easier to travel without them.

Still, she looked nothing like her regular self as Shippou had just helped to prove. Hell, she couldn't even be mistaken for human.

"I take it you were expecting Kagome?" she observed evenly. Her voice didn't even hint at her sudden descent into shallow depression and minor anger at her ghostly friend. He was having a big laugh at her right now she just knew it! 'Nobody'll be able to tell the difference' her left foot!

"How do you know Kagome-sama?" Miroku asked suspiciously though politics demanded he be polite about it.

Shippou couldn't care less about diplomacy and he very well did jump to morbid conclusions. "What have you done to Kagome? You've done something to her I just know it! Hah! Kagome's dead or wounded on her side of the well and I'll never see her again! It's all your fault! You did it!"

Aki blinked, "Geez Shippou, I hadn't realized you so disliked Kagome that you would kill her off without waiting for answers or explanations. Though I noticed you didn't ask about Inuyasha."

"Ah!" Shippou squealed hysterically. "She knows my name, she must've done something to Kagome! Kagome would never give up my name to a strange demon willingly! Now she's going to kill me and wipe out the last of my family! Don't let her do it! Don't let her get me too!" he pleaded with the monk.

"Where are Inuyasha and Kagome-sama?" Miroku demanded.

"How the hell should I know?" she shrugged. "I haven't seen them since I gave Kagome my shards and met the noisy fur ball over there."

"My but the fur ball gets louder at every meeting," Fred added as he appeared next to Aki.

"Fred!" Shippou smiled at the ghost then looked puzzled at the demon again. "Only one person has willingly given Kagome shards and she called me fur ball then too," he thought out loud.

"Do you know this demon?" Miroku questioned the kit.

"Nope, Aki was human," Shippou replied. His eyes widened on his version of a viable explanation, "This youkai has stolen Aki's mind and is using it for her own devious purposes. Oh poor Aki! Reduced to wandering as a mindless zombie in search of her mind, but doomed never to find it."

Miroku did not refrain from bopping the little kitsune on the head. Shippou's startled "Ow!" was buried under his attempts to cover his head with his small hands and Fred's uproarious laughter.

"Nope, 'fraid not," Aki shook her head strait faced. "This," she motioned to her hair and ears with her clawed fingers, "is what certain evil witches thing is hilarious."

"That's what a mind-stealing youkai would want us to think. Ow!" Shippou's semi-serious outburst was cut off by another bop on the head. "Quit that!" he hollered indignantly at the monk. They shared a heated look before the monk delivered another blow.

"I'm serous, it's really me. What'll it take for you to believe me?" Aki muttered. "I know you, Kagome and Inuyasha. I just came through the well. I'm wearing basically the same clothes as I was when I met you, except they're not covered in mud. Look, I even have a cache of shards that I was going to give to Kagome," Aki said, brandishing the little plastic cylinder. Still, Shippou looked inclined to disbeliever her. "We ascertained that Inuyasha didn't know what 'asinine' meant."

"Aki!" Shippou exclaimed, though he still leaned more towards the ghost.

"Prefer the ghost to the 'strange' youkai, do you? You prejudiced little fuzz ball you," Aki muttered.

"Well, whoever you are, I think it best you hand over those shards," Miroku declared in a reasonable voice.

"I'm not giving them to you. For all I know, you could be some random, demented bandit beating on poor Shippou until bigger fish come to fry," Aki refused, point blank. "Besides I was going to leave them with Kaede before I head out."

"Head out to where?" Miroku inquired.

"Shard hunting of course," she replied.

"But then why do you not wait for Kagome who can sense them and join us?" he asked the logical question.

"Aki-nee-san can sense them too!" Shippou informed him.

"Oh no! Not you too," Aki groaned.

"Oh she has that ability too, you say," Miroku pondered wickedly. "Perhaps I should travel with you then." After all, a good-looking female demon and a ghost could be better traveling companions than a volatile hanyou, whiny child and a well-protected miko.

"But Aki, Inuyasha calls you 'Aki-nee-san'," Shippou whined, bringing an abrupt halt to Miroku's happy train of thoughts. The explicit reason why was undeniably spelled out by Shippou's next words. "I don't think Inuyasha would like Miroku anywhere near his 'nee-san'," Aki raised an inquisitive eyebrow at that. "Kagome calls him a pervert a lot."

Aki snorted, "Don't worry Shippou, I wasn't going to let him travel with me anyway. He wouldn't be able to keep up. I seldom stop to rest, even at night, and I've gotten a lot faster than I used to be."

Dear gods! A woman with such stamina! What marvelous thing had he done correctly in a past life that the powers that be strove to reward him with such a wondrous gift? Whatever it was, he'd take it! And take it and take it…

"You can get that thought right out of your head because it's not happening," Aki cut across his daydreaming.

"My dear, I'm sure I have no idea what you could possibly mean by that," he declared innocently, his face schooled to look as unthreateningly confused as possible.

"Don't believe it Aki," Shippou eyed the monk suspiciously, "He's always doing perverted things. Kagome's started making Inuyasha keep watch for Miroku peeking on her while she bathes."

"Shippou, you wound me," the purple garbed man placed his hand over his 'wounded' chest.

"Another voyeur," Aki snorted. She just seemed to collect them like knickknacks collect dust. "Look Fred, he's a kindred spirit for you!"

Shippou had scampered away from Miroku when the monk realized his act wasn't achieving the desired response and the jig was up before he could ask his question. That all-important question that he must ask as many women as possible. Now he couldn't ask. He was most displeased. All right, he was slightly enraged, but just a little and definitely ready to pummel the querulous child. The child, he just realized, was hiding behind Aki's pant leg, clinging to it and smirking at him.

It was just like the kit to hide behind a woman.

Despite his disgruntled attention being firmly settled on the kitsune, Miroku did not miss the pointed look Fred sent the delectable female, or her equally sharp though somewhat subtle negative gesture in return. He smelled something juicily 'adult' and he would not stand for being left out despite the presence of young Shippou. "What was that about?" he raised his eyebrow at the pair, dismissing the evil child for the moment.

Aki just shrugged and braced herself. Fred was going to try to lie. Fred was a very bad liar. The lies he came up with were either so lame as to be quite a bit more than improbable (think 'nothing' and go from there) or damn near impossibly embarrassing and equally unlikely to happen. Of course no one ever believed his lies, but he persisted in the attempt, to the amused chagrin of his conspirators caught in the lie with him.

"Oh we were just continuing a previous discussion," Fred began, to Aki's controlled shock. This might actually work. "No matter what I say, I can't convince Aki to let Hanako Kiss the daylights out of her while I watch."

Aki's stomach curled up and died. Nobody in their right mind would believe-

"Hanako is a female, partial to your friend?" Miroku asked, just to ensure his understanding of the ghost's subject. At Fred's nod, Miroku's eyes slightly glazed over and he commented, "That would be a most wonderful thing to see."

Aki almost allowed her jaw to drop. The monk believed it? Hell, he wanted it to happen.

"Yeah that's what I was saying," Fred shrugged innocently, as if they were merely speculating on the weather. "But Aki just won't see it my way."

"I may have gotten you killed," Aki replied haughtily, "but my guilt is not so great as to perform intimate acts so that you can feed your vices."

"It's too bad though," Fred carefully flung his arm over the back of Miroku's shoulders in a conspiratorial manner, he had to be careful not to allow the appendage to sink into the monk's skin. He'd been told it was a most unpleasant feeling. "Hanako would've really liked it."

"Hanako wouldn't have let it stop with a kiss!" Aki declared evenly.

"Even better!" Fred cried with glee and Miroku's brain began to short circuit.

"I am not going to lead someone on just because you can't get laid!" Aki retorted shortly.

Miroku stared at her then back at the ghost. "Um, What does 'get laid' mean?" Shippou asked the monk's question.

"Ask Fred, he's the one who's so obsessed with it," Aki smirked mischievously at the ghost. The effect of which spilled over onto Miroku and he gulped. The Deviousness reflected in her eyes was quite terrifying on a very special level. A level that in no way tempered his natural reaction to a female of Aki's unique caliber.

"What does it mean, Fred?" the child's inquiry caused Fred to smirk.

The ball was in his court and he really didn't believe Shippou was as young as he appeared. "Well, it's," He began and very nearly impaled himself on the pointed end of Aki's sharp look. The monk next to him swallowed at the threat in her glare. "It's something you'll have to wait about five hundred years to figure out," He finished lamely. He really wasn't sure when that particular phrase came to be used but he was sure it wasn't tomorrow or the next day.

"Aw come on! That's too long to wait!" the boy whined at the unfairness of the world, the universe, and Fred.

"It's alright Shippou," Aki soothed the kit. "Besides you don't really want to know too many details about Fred's obsessions."

Shippou pouted but conceded her point. Fred's obsessions were probably demented and disgusting. Or maybe perverted, after all, he did want to watch Aki and this Hanako person kiss and do more stuff, not that he knew precisely what that stuff was but it was probably up the same tree as Miroku which he knew was disgusting _and_ perverted.

"In any case," Aki continued steamrolling over Fred's protest. "Fred and I need to be heading through the village now. Do you know which way your group will be going?"

"Ah no," the monk answered. "There have been no new rumors as of yet."

"Really," Aki remarked blandly. "That seems rather strange."

"Do you know where any shards might be, Aki?" Shippou asked seriously.

"Afraid not, Shippou," she replied equally as serious. "I've managed to collect everything I've come across."

"Really? And you're still not fighting for them?" Shippou couldn't believe it.

"I told you, she's got the gods' own luck," Fred remarked.

"That's really awesome," Shippou nodded to himself. "I mean even Miroku had to fight youkai to get his. What do you do?"

"I argue. I annoy. I negotiate. I outsmart. I arrange contests over them since I've taken on some crazy youkai bits of my own," Aki listed.

"Do you steal?" Shippou asked.

"No," Aki said firmly. "Everything I do is completely above board and honest. The youkai and people know what I want and what I'm doing. I don't want them that badly."

"Really? 'Cause Miroku tried stealing ours and that was one way to do it without fighting," Shippou thought to himself.

"You're not shaping up to be a very good monk," Fred shot at Miroku.

"I never claimed to be an honest monk, just humble and good." Miroku answered defensively.

"Yeah but good in what way?" Aki wondered aloud. The lecherous smirk on his face had her retracting the question. "Never mind, I don't want to know!"

"But my dear Aki, you asked a very good question. I'd love to show you," Miroku began to creep closer to her.

"I really don't want to know!" Aki took a bigger step in her stride to the village. They'd all begun to walk to Kaede's while they were talking. She had a _very_ good idea as to why Miroku had chosen to follow her, but Shippou as an escort had come as something of a surprise. "Hey Shippou, weren't you going to wait for Kagome?" she asked. Perhaps if she reminded him of his original occupation he might return to it, leaving her with only Miroku to get rid of.

"I'm making sure the monk keeps his hands to himself," Shippou replied.

"Not only a voyeur and a thief, but a lech as well," she murmured. "How could you have become a monk with such tendencies?"

"You haven't even heard his signature question yet," Shippou continued, nodding reprovingly at Miroku.

"And what could that be?" Aki asked indulgently. She didn't really care, but she could tell that Shippou was eager to expound upon the monk's many perversities.

"He asks nearly every girl he meets 'Will you bare my child?'" Shippou really got in the spirit of things and acted the part of a suave delinquent, even attempting to mimic Miroku's voice. "Then he feels their bottom which they always object to. Kagome's almost certain he was brain-damaged as a child!"

"Please tell me you don't actually say that," Fred grimaced. "That has to be the absolute worst pick up line I've ever heard. You don't really think you're going to get any action from that, do you?"

"Ah," Miroku hung his head. "Might you have some pointers for this humble monk then?"

Fred snorted, with all of his greater knowledge, of course he had pointers!

Aki cut him off before he could speak. "I very much doubt that anything Fred could teach you would do you any good. This is after all, a different day and age then from when you were alive," she soothed the ghost's ego.

"True," Fred acknowledged her point. "The times and people are different. Too bad though."

"Is it that different where you and Kagome-sama come from?" Miroku asked curiously.

"It's so different there's hardly a similarity to relate to," Fred answered.

"They're not that different Fred," Aki countered him. "You're comparing across times, cultures – oh no," she groaned as a specific scent reached her. "Why couldn't we have been quicker about dropping these off again?" She had tensed considerably in the space of a second.

"Because fur ball and voyeur didn't believe you were you," Fred smirked. "Really you could just out run her."

"That's rude," Aki answered absently just before a sizable creature bounded into their presence and trapped her against a nearby tree in an overly sincere hug.

"AKIII!" the rabbit youkai cried, dementedly happy to have her paws on her favorite person once again. "Why do you insist on keeping your sexy self gone so long?" Hanako whined. "Have you come to visit? Are you going to stay a while? Why are you in the company of _that_ male? I don't think you should be anywhere near him! I saw him come in with that perverted hanyou, and he never leaves Kaede's errant apprentice alone, even when she bathes! The kit's alright I suppose," the rabbit youkai dismissed him, "though he also came in with the perverted hanyou – "

"Hanako! Must Breathe!" Aki gasped while pushing her admirer away.

"Errant apprentice? Perverted hanyou?" Miroku asked confused, both at the descriptions and the sudden appearance of a strange youkai that knew all about him and the group.

"The errant apprentice is probably Kagome and trust me, it's one of her more flattering descriptions for the girl," Fred smiled ruefully. "Inuyasha's the perverted hanyou, though all things male are perverted in Hanako's opinion. You, me, Shippou, the village, Helpless puppies on the side of the road…"

Miroku blinked, what a strange creature. "Who's Hanako?" he asked for clarification, he could probably guess and very likely be right though.

The ghost stared at him in disbelief then pointed at Hanako.

"You don't know who Hanako is?" Aki asked. Both the monk and Shippou shook their heads. "But she's always here, she's supposed to be watching the village."

"Correction, I'm looking after the village with Kaede," Hanako declared. "I don't introduce myself to perverts that come in with the perverted dog boy and head straight for Kaede's in a peaceful enough manner. I figure only one of us should be distracted by their antics." The bunny sniffed. "So are you going to spend sometime with your love bunny or are you going to chase after more of those little pieces of trouble?"

Aki gritted her teeth at Hanako's new self-given pet name. The rabbit was all the time trying to get Aki to call her by endearments of a generally suggestive nature.

"We'll be chasing trouble of course," Fred delighted in crushing Hanako's attempts at a relationship with Aki. It wasn't because he looked down on same sex pairings. Hell, he was all for a little girl on girl action, as long as he got to watch. No, he liked cutting off Hanako's attempts just to watch her reaction.

And it was hilarious to be sure. A sweet smelling ball of leaves was launched through his head to impact on Miroku's shoulder and burst open dispersing the leaves to the whims of the moving air. The monk blinked in surprise while Hanako erupted at Fred, "Butt out you perverted afterlife reject! You just wish you were alive and female so you could partake of the purest form of love that ever was!"

"And which form of love is the purest again?" he asked because he was absolutely certain he could rebuff the answer.

"The love of two females with each other of course!" Came Hanako's very predictable response.

"That's not the purest form of love," Fred declared.

"What!" Hanako screeched.

"The purest form of love is the one of yourself. You will not hurt yourself unless you desire it. You can't leave yourself, so it _will_ last forever and your love can never be stolen away from you." Fred answered smirking smugly. Try to beat that!

"That's perverted!" Hanako rejected the idea based solely on its being offered by a male. "No creature can survive without the love and care of others, therefore mine is still best!"

Love of one's self, huh, Miroku mused. He imagined some of his female acquaintances indulging in some 'self love'. They looked to be having too much fun for it not to be sinful. He was just going to have to see to it that their energy was directed into other 'less sinful' activities.

Aki glanced at the terrible stars in Hanako's eyes and the drool forming on Miroku's mouth and finally decided to bolt. She highly doubted her rudeness would in any way hurt either of them trapped as they were in their own personal La-la lands. She picked up Shippou and made a clean escape, even managing to ditch Fred. Perhaps they'd distract each other so much she'll make it out of the village before they recovered.

Aki snorted, Yeah right. That'll be the day the sky falls down.

"Aki, child," a familiar old voice called.

"Kaede," Aki greeted the elderly miko who was currently gazing past her as she approached. The former English tutor frowned, "What are you looking for?"

"The parade that usually follows you," Kaede replied evenly. "I had some things to discuss with Hanako and I figured with Shippou here Miroku would be coming in as well."

Aki grimaced, "They're all busily attending a summit in fantasyland." Kaede's quizzical look forced her to elaborate. "Hanako is imagining her idea of pure love, which I'm sure includes me in an out-of-character experience. Fred is delighting in instigating her more expressive declarations and having a great deal of fun toying with the insides of Miroku's imagination. Miroku is drowning in the sensual after images brought about by Fred's cleverly worded arguments with Hanako. His images most likely also include me having an out-of-character experience."

The corner of Kaede's old mouth headed north at the thought of so many minds heading south in the presence of the female in front of her. Though one thing had her slightly confused. "Why out-of-character and not out-of-body?"

"Because they don't want me out of my body, they want to join me inside of it," Aki replied evenly.

"Aki, child, you have a way with words," the old miko chuckled. "I'm surprised to see you again so soon. Last I saw you there were a great many problems you had to deal with."

Aki nodded, having the fact that she was part demon sprung on her like that had left her reeling. "Yeah, but it turns out I almost instinctively knew how to do what I needed to learn, the rest is just practice and patience. We won't know all that I can do until I suddenly find myself doing it." Aki shrugged to loosen her shoulders as Shippou jumped down to go play. "Fred says my mother and grandmother planted the knowledge before the spell was cast. They knew the spell would wear off one day, they just didn't expect it to be broken like it was."

"Well at least they thought to provide you with the knowledge you would need," Kaede nodded. "And you seem to have gotten used to moving with your new extremities."

Aki nodded, "Like I said, all I need is practice. I've actually come through the well before on a test run to see if I was up to resuming the shard hunt."

"You were successful I take it?" Kaede smiled.

Aki offered up a quirky smile, "Yeah, hence why I'm stopping here." She dug out her shards in their plastic container and handed it over to the old miko. "I thought I might've run into Kagome on our side of the well, but it didn't happen."

"She should be here soon, why don't you wait?" Kaede suggested.

"Nah, I need to get moving," she stretched her arms over her head to help loosen up the new muscles she was developing.

A couple of nearly mature boys stopped to stare surprised at the feeling that ran through them at the sight. Kaede chuckled at them gently.

"What?" Aki asked in confusion, the old miko gestured to the boys. Their faces, one and all, were flaming up as they hastily looked elsewhere. "You'd think they got caught with their hands in the cookie jar." She was still confused. Why would they look at her like that?

"It's not just them, married men are careful not to gaze upon you for fear of getting caught by their wives reacting the way those boys did," Kaede informed her.

"I still don't get it, I'm no raving beauty. Why, where I come from people would normally pass me over for something better," Aki told Kaede honestly. She'd certainly never had a bevy of admirers following _her_ around.

"That may be, but even before you changed the villagers noticed you," Kaede said gently. Still the other woman's face was filled with confusion. The miko sighed, "What you are, Aki, is rare. These people have never met anyone with your coloring before. Your manner of dress is provocative and strange in their eyes. You forget that their idea of physical beauty is a woman with most of her teeth and hair that doesn't fall out, a strong body and childbearing hips. Anything more than that is otherworldly. They revered you as a miko after you saved the children down at the river and the men felt guilty to feel," here the miko chuckled, "what they felt for a holy woman. Now that you've become youkai, what little guilt they feel is only when they are caught by their wives. They still revere you for your power and generosity of spirit, but now you're game for depravity."

"Do my hips really look like good childbearing ones? I hadn't realized I was that big." Aki asked the miko dismissing the rest of what she just said. Sure she was now going to avoid the village like the plague, but while she was here she wasn't going to let the mass exodus of reason among the villagers get to her. Their adulterous desire for her participation in their fantasies was not going to affect her. Nope. Her policy in this situation would be 'hear no evil, see no evil, smell no evil' and run like a bat out of hell at the first opportunity.

And in the future, Aki would be careful about saving children in front of entire villages. From now on she would do all her saving of people in private, the better to keep track of who knew about it in order to avoid them forever afterwards. She never wanted to be faced with such a weird, lusty situation again!

"I don't understand why so many of you young ladies assume you have to have a great deal of weight to have good hips for childbirth," Kaede shook her head.

"Maybe it's because you have to gain so much weight when you're pregnant," Aki suggested with a shrug. "In any case, I gave you the shards, let you know the situation and now I'd like to take off while the 'parade' is still late."

Kaede nodded, "Alright then. Careful child, there is much out there that will do harm to gain the shards."

"Don't worry about me," Aki shrugged off her concern. "They can't really hurt me, and they'll never be able to kill me."

"Before you go, Aki, answer me one question and please be truthful. Do you ever fight for the shards?" Kaede asked.

"I don't kill for them Kaede, isn't it enough to know that?"

The miko sighed. The woman from the future did fight, though it was probably more in defense and most likely very unconventional by the standards of the age. Aki hadn't said she didn't fight, just that she didn't kill. Perhaps she had lied to the others and they had believed it. They believed it because they wanted to, because it made them feel better to believe Aki was in no danger.

It surprised Kaede that Aki's friend wasn't more against this. It surprised her that Aki wanted to do this on her own. It made the miko ponder just what motivated the woman as Aki walked to the edge of the village before sprinting into the trees.


	2. Soul Collector

Installment 2! This time we get to see the miko everybody loves to hate, or at least gretly dislike. There's no real Kikyou bashing here, as I'm kind of ambivalent towards her existence, but Fred sure doesn't like her! At the very least they don't see eye to eye. Could be fun!

I have an interview today, so wish me luck. It's at wal-mart, and I know it's not the best job in the world, but I desperately need employment. I'd like to get my Credit card paid off and keep paying all the necessities, like Student loan payments... So seriuosly, send me all the good Juju you can. After all, you don't want me to be unable to finish this off because I had to pawn my computer or something.

On that note, if I do get this job and I either don't start before The first weekend in may or by some seriously miraculous stroke of luck I get the time off, I might be going to Acen! YAY! I really want to go because I didn't get to last year and I want to be able to rub it in that I got to go this year while all my friends still back in college couldn't because the con is held during finals week. It would so rock!

Ahem, so yeah, we'll see.

The experiments of the Inuyasha crew shall resume as soon as Rumiko Takahashi okays the use of various makes of Applesauce and it's crude product.

**Soul Collector**

Friendship is a prison of choice. We choose our friends and by that very choice we dictate to ourselves how we shall act and just what we will put up with. We determine how long it will last or what would be grounds for the immediate termination of camaraderie.

And often we do things that are disagreeable to ourselves to maintain these special prisons, to keep them from turning hostile and uncomfortable. Like not courting your crush because you know your friend is crushing on them too. Or forcing yourself to share your very special and rare personal treat so that your friend does not feel abused and neglected.

Sometimes when your _dead_ friend starts complaining about something you're not doing, you do it, just to shut him up.

Hence why Aki was taking a break in the middle of a very nice day. She didn't need the respite and normally wouldn't have wasted the time, but Fred, her very noisy and overly concerned friend had been constantly yelling at her to take a rest quite a bit longer than a Nascar pit stop.

Why would a dead guy need her to rest? So he could damn well catch up for more than two minutes, that's why! He was sick and tired of being left in the dust waiting for her to stop long enough for him to beam over to her only to have her take off right after he appeared. Fred would holler and curse after her to no avail. She never came back.

Those few occasions when they would find themselves in the presence of a Shikon wielding problem, either the altercation was so quick as to be barely long enough for him to catch up or Fred would have to remain invisible for the duration. It turned out Shippou and What's-his-name's reactions had been a good indication of how the rest of this archaic world would view a ghost like him.

Ghosties were not perceived with anything less than torrid fear. As if he could actually do anything. He wished he knew half of what these people did. It'd be even cooler if he could actually do a tenth of what they believed he could.

And if he could? Why, the first thing he would do is smack Aki for constantly leaving him behind and neglecting her health. And Fred was really stellar about telling her that.

Which, again, is why Aki was sitting lazily in a tree with few leaves left in its branches. She was waiting for her dead friend to catch up and lecture her while she completely ignored him.

That was the plan anyway. It was a simple plan, with almost no point, but it was her plan and she truly intended to implement it upon Fred's arrival.

Someone else arrived first.

"Hand over your jewel shards, youkai!" a strong voice shouted.

Aki looked down to see the gleaming point of an arrow aimed at her. "I must say, this is the first time I've ever been threatened with an aerial weapon for the jewel shards. Most everybody else uses their bare claws or a blade of some kind," she commented dryly.

"Hand them over, you tainted creature!" the other woman shouted again.

"I think not," Aki refused. "After all, you didn't say please."

The stranger in miko robes didn't even change her expression though Aki could tell she'd caught the other off guard.

"It doesn't matter anyway," Aki added, a dismissive tone in her voice. "I wouldn't have given them to you."

The strange woman released her arrow and it hit true to her aim with a sharp THWACK as it pierced the tree.

"What'd you go and hurt the tree for?" Aki asked, completely disregarding the arrow's closeness. It still vibrated in the air where she had just been lounging. She had seemingly nonchalantly moved upon the arrows release from the bow and was now sitting a foot away from it. "What'd this poor defenseless tree ever do to you?" She reached out two fingers and purified the arrow out of existence, simultaneously healing the wounded tree.

"What are you?" the stranger demanded, her eyes slightly wider than before.

"I'm confused," Aki replied. "What sort of miko are you that you'd attack someone you don't know over something that isn't yours without warning? Aren't mikos supposed to be more honorable than that?"

"I thought you were youkai."

"And what does being youkai have to do with anything?" Aki asked, refusing to give an inch. "You assumed that because my parents were cut from a different fabric than yours, because I'm a different species from you made it alright for you to attack before trying to figure out if I deserved it. Different does not mean bad. Youkai does not mean evil any more than being human means that you are good. Assumption and prejudice are some of the most destructive evils the world has ever and will ever know. I would think that as a miko, you would try to stifle its continued propagation. Wariness I can understand, caution is wise but attacking without attempts to negotiate first? Some of the most violent wars have started that way."

"A youkai with such a store of jewel shards has no right to say such things," the strange miko declared.

"And why not? Do you assume that I came by these dishonorably? You think I killed for these?" Aki asked the quiet but accusing woman. "I'll have you know I haven't killed anyone for these. I never attacked without warning unless I was being stalked first and I normally win them in wagered contests. In a way you could say these are my winnings. Not that you should care, you haven't got any shards."

"You can sense the shards?"

"So can you."

"And you have miko powers."

"So it would appear."

"Careful Aki! She's just like those clay dolls that witch had when she cast that spell on you!" Fred announced as he finally caught up at the wrong moment.

Aki had to dash in order to keep the stranger from shooting him. "You must be evil you keep company with ghosts!"

"There you go again, assuming things!" Aki shouted. "You don't know anything about him!"

The miko gazed coldly at the youkai before her. "You want to know that I did to the witch that resurrected me?" Kikyou asked darkly sweet. She placed her hands on the youkai and demonstrated.

"Ah. Unn. Oh." Aki playfully groaned in fake death throws. She kicked her foot gently into the nearest tree a couple of times before groaning again. "It burns."

"Aki," Fred hissed angrily.

"Yes Fred," Aki answered and smiled innocently at him.

"I hate you," he grumbled.

"Love you too," she responded cheekily.

Kikyou blinked. The demon should be a pile of purified smoking dust. What was going on here?

"You didn't actually think that would kill me did you?" Aki asked gently. "You just saw me purify your arrow and heal the tree. Surely you must have realized that having such powers myself would have granted some small ability to withstand it. I mean, I may blister the hell out of my hands, but that's all," Aki waved her damaged hand at Kikyou. "What you just did will leave me with a sunburn that'll peel in a couple days."

Kikyou was speechless. A holy youkai? Was that even possible? The youkai and the ghost proceeded to argue amongst themselves. Was she in the wrong?

"Still, if you did that to the Urasei then we won't have to worry about running into her again," Aki declared charmingly.

"That doesn't mean you can trust her," The ghost whined. "She did just attack you!"

The ghost was right, Kikyou had attacked, not once but twice, and neither time did Aki retaliate with more than words. Perhaps she truly had been wrong. "Come here," Kikyou grabbed Aki's wrist and dragged her away from their pointless argument.

She led the youkai and gaping specter into a nearby glade where she plucked leaves from plants known for their ability to sooth burns. Kikyou let go of Aki to prepare them for application.

"What is she doing?" Fred asked suspiciously.

"Looks like she's going to try to take care of my hand," Aki answered absently. "Hey, you know you don't have to that, right? I already have stuff for burns with me," Aki dug out her container of Aloe Vera to show the miko.

Kikyou looked up and eyed the strange container. "What is that?"

"Aloe Vera," Aki answered. "A plant whose healing properties have been known almost longer than history has been written down."

Kikyou snorted, "Who would bother to write it down when so many have no use for reading?"

"You'd be surprised," Aki answered mysteriously. "Hey that reminds me," she snapped her fingers, "Introduction haven't been made. I'm Aki and this is Fred. Those aren't our real names I'm afraid, but I can't remember mine anymore and it's just too much fun pissing him off by calling him Fred."

"I am Kikyou," the clay doll in their company answered as she bent to apply the medicine to Aki's hand.

"Good to know," Aki acknowledged. "You know, you remind me of someone."

"If you say my reincarnation I will find the nearest poisonous plan and jam it down your throat!"

"Wow! You have a reincarnation? Who is it?" Aki exclaimed, happily ignoring the threat.

"Kag-something," Kikyou replied.

"You and Kagome? No way! I mean Kagome's always so open and effervescent and you're –well what I know of you – you're not." Aki smiled in wonderment. "No you don't remind me of Kagome at all. You two don't have anything in common, you even smell different."

"How would you know, you haven't seen her since before that witch broke the spell that kept you human!" Fred exclaimed.

"Yeah, but her room doesn't smell like anybody else as strongly," Aki retorted. "As I was saying, it isn't Kagome you remind me of. You remind me of that one guy I helped when I was still human. He was just as unexpressive as you are and couldn't seem to control his temper around me."

"Oh you mean the guy I wished was a girl," Fred remembered. "Of course I didn't get to spend time with him while he wasn't snarling at me," he grumbled. "He would've done really, super well if he'd gone into business as a man whore."

"I can't believe you!" Aki exclaimed in mild disgust. "That's totally inappropriate and what are you doing thinking of him as a man whore anyway?"

"I was thinking we might have actually found a way for you to finally get some action!" Fred answered loudly.

"That's it! Next time you complain about how fast I've gotten I'm going to speed up just to spite you!"

"Excuse me," Kikyou interrupted their spat. "How could you have been human before?"

"Aki's lived most of her life a human. When we ran into that witch you apparently killed we found out it was a spell that made her that way. The Urasei essentially broke it," Fred answered.

"I've been human most of my life. Do you know how hard it is to suddenly not be what you always were?" Aki asked.

"Yes," Kikyou answered remembering how it felt to wake up dead one day.

"Then you might be able to understand," Aki shrugged.

Or maybe it would be the other way around. Kikyou was fairly certain she was past her days of empathy. The dead could only do so much.

"YOU!" A snarling voice called imperiously. "Hand over the Shikon no kakera!"

"Why do I feel this strange sense of de ja vu?" Aki snorted. "Were the 'attack Aki' coupons on sale again?"

The strangely clad new comer didn't bother to answer before lunging at her aggressively.

"Whoa!" Aki dodged his move. She kept dodging as the altercation began to push her into more densely wooded areas. Always she was two feet ahead of the end of his lunge and just so much faster she began to give him tips and encouragement. Cool as a cucumber, she moved and spoke, "Bring your elbows in, you're allowing too much air drag. There, see you almost got me that time. Don't give up, you're getting closer." It was all nonsense of course. Aki could dance circles around almost every youkai she'd come across.

The youkai paused, panting through his very human-looking mouth. The head of some dead animal with a white pelt concealed the rest of his face. Aki likewise paused, barely short of breath. "Oh come on, you can't give up yet! I've still got the shards," she pouted.

He gave one more lunge at her and Aki dodged it swiftly to land on the crumbling edge of a deep ravine. Unfortunately, Aki had moved backwards so she wasn't completely aware of the drop until the ground gave out and down she went.

"AKI!" Fred shouted and hurried over to the edge of the ravine. Of course hurrying for a ghost is like watching a snail race, a very slow process in comparison to other things hurrying.

Kikyou calmly notched an arrow in her ever-present bow and launched it at Aki's attacker before he could do more than begin to turn at the sound. Her powers purified him until even the little wooden puppet with the hair wrapped around it was gone. Then she walked to where her new acquaintance had fallen.

Just as she was close enough to look down into the ravine, Aki hauled her torso over the edge. She had a chunk gouged out of her left eyebrow and her knuckles were scraped and bleeding. "Who the hell puts a ravine in the middle of a forest without staking up warning signs?" Aki grumbled climbing the rest of the way over the lip of the ravine.

"This is why I keep telling you that you should learn how to fly," Fred scolded her.

"Humph! I'd rather just suddenly find out I can fly when some demon throws me off a cliff. I think it would be way cooler that way," Aki replied primly.

"You can fly?" Kikyou asked.

"No, I can't," Aki answered pointedly.

"But he thinks you could," Kikyou eroded the point.

"What else could the wings be for?" Fred grumbled.

"Do you remember how long it took me to relearn how to walk, Fred?" Aki demanded. "I'm not going to work on flying until I need to."

"Why not?" the ghost asked belligerently.

"You know how birds learn to fly? They're pushed out of the nest and they either learn how to fly or fall to their deaths," Aki answered evenly.

"You'll fly."

"I'll fall."

"I can ensure that you won't fall," Kikyou said as she doctored Aki's minor wounds.

"Excuse me, but you look rather grounded there, if you don't mind my saying so," Ai coughed facetiously. "How could you possibly – "

The slender silvery bodies of Kikyou's lifeline eeled towards them through the trees, each burdened with a luminous ball of ethereal white in the slowly darkening forest.

"That's how you've survived without the Urasei around to maintain you," Fred snarled, "Feeding on the souls of the recently dead!"

"Fred, shut up," Aki sighed absently. Her glazed eyes were staring at her cupped palm, her brow creased in concentration.

"I notice they're all young human girls," he continued disgustedly. "Your prejudice reflects in your appetite."

"I don't control who they bring me," Kikyou defended herself.

"Well, you should!" Fred declared.

"It isn't like I go out and kill the girls so I can consume them," Kikyou retorted.

"No, you just prevent them from becoming ghosts or finding their own ways towards where they want to go," Fred accused. "You couldn't just be a ghost like every other self respecting dead person. No, you had to be something that eats souls!"

Before Kikyou could begin again, before Fred could continue, Aki distracted them both. In her cupped hand glowed a sphere similar to those that Kikyou had just taken into her self. Aki marched up to the clay miko and shoved it into her chest with such force that several of the girls' souls were expelled from the dead miko's body. "That ought to do you for a couple days at least," Aki said to herself. "And it should help minimize your soul intake."

Kikyou gasped and choked on the sudden new sensations overwhelming her. There was such pain, a sorrow so profound, surely the heavens must be weeping. "What have you done?" the miko's eyes were round with shock and confusion.

"I gave you a piece of my soul," Aki answered tiredly. It was exhausting giving away a piece of soul.

"AKI!" Fred yelled angrily.

"Do shut up, Fred," Aki responded before continuing to talk to Kikyou. "You shouldn't be so surprised. You do carry a piece of Kagome's soul, albeit an enraged one. I dislike dragging others into my personal hell, and I dislike watching others do so also. I cannot keep you from doing so all together, but I can help reduce the number of victims that fall to your continued existence," Aki sighed. "Besides, what is anger without reason? What is rage without sorrow? It's dangerous and destructive and I hate to see it. So I gave you reason, I gave you sorrow. Now when you move to act in anger you will think of the sorrow it will cause. When you strike out in rage you will hold back knowing the pain it would cause."

"I am not a dumping ground for your pains and sadness!" Kikyou growled at her.

Aki just laughed joylessly. "You think I've dumped my pain and heartache on you?" She shook her head, "What utter bullshit!" Kikyou opened her mouth to rebuff her and Aki cut her off. "You just assumed that's what I did! Well let me enlighten you, what I gave you was joyful compared to what I kept! I've still got the lion's share of it! But if you really want me to 'dump' on you, I'd be glad to oblige," she spat.

Fred cut the dead miko off before she could say anything else to upset Aki. "I wouldn't if I were you. I can and will free you of that body if you choose to call her anything derogatory and upset her any further."

"Leave her alone, Fred!" Aki yelled and shook her head. "We were leaving anyway."

"What?" Kikyou asked in shock. This stranger had made it so Kikyou didn't have to eat as often and now she was going to leave without any kind of repayment? "What about flying?" the dead miko asked. "I was going to help remember?"

"I said I wasn't going to learn," Aki answered.

"But you really should," Kikyou admonished her.

"There's a lot of things I should and shouldn't do, but I don't care and neither should you," Aki shrugged and turned to leave only to be swamped by a dizzy spell. Next thing she knew she was falling and they were shouting her name.

"This is your fault!" Fred declared.

"My fault? How is this my fault?" Kikyou asked skeptically.

"If you hadn't taken a piece of her soul – "

"I didn't take it! She shoved it at me. Besides what makes you so sure that's what caused this?" Kikyou was tired of being criticized for what she was. Why should she continually be accused of things? "Maybe if you weren't always nagging and arguing with her she wouldn't be so exhausted!"

"What would you know about it!" Fred yelled.

"She was alone when I came across her, was she avoiding you by chance?" Kikyou eyed him levelly.

Aki pushed herself off the tree she'd fallen against and gave them both an incredulous look. They were arguing. She had just fallen and alarmed them and they were arguing. Did they realize that the only argument they should be having is over how to correct the situation? She shrugged, who cared?

Aki turned away from them slowly and began walking away. She doubted they'd notice until they settled who was to blame. Maybe she would've been better able to pull off her escape if she'd paid more attention to where the ravine was.

"AKI!" the miko and ghost yelled in unison at the sudden sound of scrabbling rocks and Aki's disappearance.

Fred floated down to where his friend had managed to catch herself on an exposed root. "Just how the hell did you manage to fall this time? What were you thinking?"

"Um, woops?" She mumbled up at him. He didn't really expect her to answer, right?

"You fell down the ravine for the second time and all you can say is 'woops'?" If Fred were alive he'd be turning purple. "Woops would be for the fist time you fell down it."

"Would you rather I say 'D'oh!' or something? How about something absolutely random like 'Tuesday'?" Aki asked while trying to find footholds before her lifeline gave out. Rather abruptly, the root let her drop another few feet down the ravine. "Whoa!" her heart fluttered and her muscles froze.

"Aki! Don't Move!" Fred shouted.

"Naw, you think?" Aki grumbled irritably. "So exactly how were you planning on getting me out of this? 'Cause I really don't feel like hanging around until the end of time you know."

"I'm working on it," Fred muttered.

"Yeah well you work on it while I get myself out of this mess," Aki muttered and started looking for footholds again.

"Aki! I told you not to move," The ghost yelled as Aki's endeavors released another trickle of rocks cascading down the side of the ravine.

Kikyou sighed as she looked down the side of the ravine. It was unlike her to allow a strange male's words to upset her so much. It was even more unlike her to argue and defend her actions. She had always allowed her actions to speak for themselves and others could derive their meaning anyway they so desired.

Perhaps it was the piece of Aki's soul that had her acting so different. Kikyou had already observed that the other woman tended to argue a great deal with her friend. But then, their friendly spats were almost completely devoid of anger or rancor and her argument with the ghost had been filled with some amount of venom. Even now she found herself flaring at the specter.

Why? It made no sense.

She sighed again. It was something to ponder another time. Right now, a terribly generous soul was in a very precarious position because of Kikyou's own neglect. If she hadn't been so wrapped up in her strange argument over blame, Aki would never have been allowed to take another step. It was clear the woman couldn't be trusted to look after herself and was badly in need of care. The kind of care a miko, like Kikyou used to be, could provide.

She raised her eyebrow as Aki and Fred continued to argue back and forth. One might suppose they could be siblings or lovers, not that it was any of her business. Of course, she was sure Aki could do better.

Shoving that thought aside Kikyou signaled to the Shinidamachuu over her left should to go retrieve Aki.

It flowed down the side like liquid mercury, a few of its fellows following suit. The silver ribbons of their bodies glowed in the ever-darkening night, clearly visible against the darker shadows of the disrupted earth and rock.

Aki had managed to find a single semi-secure foothold and was resting her weight on it while searching for another before releasing the much abused tree root when the first shinidamachuu circled her waist and brushed against her exposed skin where her shirt had torn in the subsequent falls she had taken. In her shock at the sensation she almost let go of her root, which would have been a bad idea.

The moment Kikyou's little soul collecting youkai touched Aki it convulsed around her, squeezing too tight in some places and allowing too much slack in others. Without her hold on the root she would have fallen as the creature's writhing knocked her out of the foothold in such a way as to destroy it.

"Damn it Kikyou!" Fred growled angrily. "Call off your snake – thingies!"

Kikyou gazed down at her youkai concealing her surprise. She'd never seen them act this way. It was like Aki's very being was contaminating it, turning it a pale white-blue. To someone else it would look the same, but to Kikyou the difference was easily discernable. Especially since its companions were the same as always.

As the change finished and the youkai's coloring became uniform over the whole of it, the convulsing stopped and it gripped Aki almost lovingly.

Kikyou raised an eyebrow. These youkai were in no way affectionate with anyone, not even their own species. Yet there was her soul collector squeezing Aki in a serpentine hug as it cradled her body like a precious treasure. They'd never done that with even Kikyou, whom they were most partial too. Curious.

The shinidamachuu set Aki gently on her feet farther away from the ravine's edge than Kikyou stood and with a final squeeze and a slithery kiss, sailed away to coil around its fellows above them.

"Ew! Slimy!" Aki wiped off her cheek, fighting her creeping skin unsuccessfully. "I wish you'd just let me fall."

"I said I would make it so you wouldn't fall," Kikyou replied. "Now sit down, shut up, and allow me to tend you wounds. Then you are going to rest until the sun comes up!"

"Quit ordering Aki around!" Fred shouted.

"I'm not tired," Aki declared quietly at the same time.

Fred glanced at her then at Kikyou, weighing his dislike for the soul eater against her ability to force Aki back to slightly better health. The real question is how much did he really like Aki alive and healthy? Fred grumbled unintelligibly for a minute. "Good luck trying to get her to sleep," he said.

"Why?" Kikyou demanded slightly wary of his statement.

"She doesn't sleep," He answered.

"'She' is right here and not tired, now let's get a move on," Aki turned to take a step away from the void that was the ravine. She thought it was kind of strange that the black hole in there was only determined to suck _her_ down. Not that it mattered.

"Hold it right there! I said sit down, shut up, and let me care for you injuries. If you refuse to be reasonable and do so on your own I will have my shinidamachuu come down here and pin you to a convenient tree while I work," Kikyou threatened.

"And then what? You gonna let them Ravish me?" Aki snorted.

"Why would they do that? Only the one was acting strange," Kikyou puzzled aloud.

Aki pointed up without looking, "Yeah well, the craziness has spread."

Kikyou's eyes followed the path Aki indicated and blinked in astonishment, "Um," was all she could say as Fred cursed.

"Well I guess if it comes to that I'll have to let them ravish you," Kikyou declared.

"What?" Fred howled in disbelief.

She smirked at him; did he really think she was going to back down just because Aki's own contaminating presence had infected the entire pack when they weren't looking? Truly he must be stupid! And Kikyou took relish in the thought. The miko held her smirk until she caught the smirk on Aki's face.

"It's a good thing they're sexless then isn't it?" Aki confided in her and Kikyou blinked.

"Really," she gazed up at the formerly silver bodies of her feeders. Kikyou had never really thought about it before, but they certainly did seem to maintain the pack numbers without much effort. Perhaps she should pay more attention the next time the pack is cut down in size by an enemy.

Aki leaned back against a tree gazing up at the serpentine creatures dancing amongst the shadowy branches. Their unique grace and easy movement was beautiful and mesmerizing, and Aki noted absently, slightly dizzying. Or was the dizziness just her? She shrugged, who cared?

Kikyou glance back at the infection her soul collectors had caught. The other woman was jerking to correct her balance every so often. Apparently Aki was suffering some amount of vertigo.

Kikyou shook her head and moved to take a closer look at the gouge in the other woman's head. Aki's gaze shifted and she pressed back into the tree, watching her. Aki's movement gave the dead miko pause.

Aki's stance was much like that of a threatened wounded and delirious youkai. She appeared as if she might lunge forward and knock whoever approached into the next moon cycle. Kikyou recognized it having seen it many times just before she delivered the killing blow.

It was the look in Aki's eyes that had the miko second-guessing. Aki was watching her, but without wariness or suspicion. There was no fear or caution in the youkai's eyes. They barely shone with mild curiosity.

Either Aki didn't view Kikyou as a threat; an insult (or compliment) of great magnitude, or Aki just plain didn't care what happened to her. In the case of the second, Kikyou's work was more than cut out for her.

Kikyou approached slowly, not wanting to set off the lunging/killing part of the youkai in front of her.

Aki huffed out the unique scent of Kikyou's fear. It smelled horribly like sulfur and she just couldn't shake the smell of it. It was making her nauseous, quite a feat in and of itself since she hadn't eaten in days. "What are you so afraid for, Kikyou?" Aki demanded grumpily. "You're already dead. What more can a person do? You expect some great entity out there to come up with death for the dead? They're having enough trouble trying to kill someone who should already be dead."

"By your own argument you should be terrified," Kikyou pointed out while taking another step closer.

"Why?" Aki asked tiredly.

"Because you are still alive," Kikyou answered.

Aki laughed derisively. "There are many kinds of death, Kikyou. They may not all be terminal but they are fatal to something that was once alive, a body, a mind or a soul."

If Kikyou were alive, she might have shivered at Aki's creepy declaration. If she were alive, she very likely would've let it drop and continued on her way, shaking off the encounter. But Kikyou was dead and she was determined to dress Aki's many hurts. And being dead made little else seem creepy anymore.

At least now Kikyou knew Aki wouldn't pounce. Though she wasn't sure if it was better for Aki to disregard the dangers of the world because she didn't care than to simply view Kikyou as a non-threat. Being a non-threat required less work and care. Kikyou sighed.

"Let me help you, travel with you, so that I can see that Youkai are not all bad. Let me learn the lesson, if the lesson is there to be learned, that youkai are simply people like anyone else," Kikyou suggested. She figured offering to let Aki dissuade the miko of her prejudices might make it easier to help the strange woman.

Aki sighed, before reluctantly agreeing, "Fine, but I don't rest often and Fred complains a lot."

"Do not!" The ghost yelled defensively.

Kikyou gestured to the ground for Aki to sit. "Indeed." Her not life just got more interesting. Perhaps she was a bit old to be learning new things, but learning not to hate was a lesson worth the effort.

Besides, she did want to help Aki learn to fly.


	3. Tail Feathers

Hurray! Harroo! Harinamous! Whatever, it's another installment of my favorite fanfic! heehee!

And I'm in an especially good mood so I thought I would give a list of just WHAT Aki carries around in her very own mystery bag. You may or may not care, but I thought people might want to know.

There are actually two lists because Aki didn't exactly pack her bag the first time with the idea of not having any other luggage with her. If you remember, all she had was whatever was last minute packing for her camping trip.

So for the first part of this story, Aki had: some tarp, an iron skillet (smallish), some rope, trail mix, puzzle book, pencil, some bandages, one can of condensed soup, can opener, tooth brush and tooth paste, one rough handmade mug, some instant hot chocolate, a water bottle, empty film tube, chopsticks picked up on the way, bar of soap, and an extra pair of socks. This is not counting what she happened to be carrying in her pocket which doesn't really change much.

AFter Aki's unfortunate encounter with the witch, Aki had the chance to go home and pack a little better for her trip. A lot of the items remained the same: The tarp, rope, soup, can opener, toothbrush and tooth paste, hot chocolate, skillet, film tube, and bar of soap all remained the same, but she added a bit more spare clothing, a new unsentimental mug (after all, Sesshoumaru might throw a fit again or something!), Shampoo and conditioner, an actual first aid kit, and a container of Aloe Vera. This is of course, an incomplete list, and the items will change over time. Just like with the first batch of stuff, some will get lost, some will be damaged or destroyed and again it doesn't include what she happens to be carrying around inher pockets like a cell phone and a pocket knife for cutting rope etc.

Of course Aki's bag has nothing on The bag Rumiko Takahashi created for Kagome. that bag and those characters are quite impossible to surpass sometimes. Good thing they're all my playthings until long after my grandchildren are dead.

**Tail Feathers**

It is said that gravity is one of the most common attractive forces in the universe. One would think that something responsible for so much bruising and broken bodies would be considered repulsive. Add in that gravity is also responsible for shortening or limiting a great number of people's height and you really do wonder what is so attractive about gravity.

Granted, without gravity, the air would be too thin to breath and our evolution may well have not included walking upright for up (and any other direction) is relative to our own orientation caused by gravity. Without gravity, ground animals would have to live _in_ the ground and muscle growth would be practically pointless.

Even so, gravity is damned annoying. Especially when you're standing next to a cliff and about to be shoved off.

"I told you I don't care to learn," Aki grumbled darkly.

"And I think you should," Kikyou pushed a little more.

"Why are we starting so high anyway?" Aki demanded.

"If we tried shoving you out of a tree like a bird you'd just jump," Fred answered. Oh he was behind this a full forty percent. He didn't like Kikyou. He didn't like knocking Aki off a cliff, but she needed to learn how to fly and the miko was solid enough to force the issue. More than that, Kikyou could provide the safety net almost no one else could. True, the 'safety net' would more than likely molest Aki before they were done, Fred thought ruefully, but better molested than splattered all over the ground.

Kikyou gave another push, moving the shorter woman about an inch. Aki had dug her shoes in firmly and was definitely making the miko earn every inch of ground they moved forward. "Why are you being so stubborn?" Kikyou half-grumbled between pants for air. She hadn't thought the dead could get out of breath.

"I could ask you that," Aki retorted. "Why are you so determined for me to learn to fly? One might almost believe you were concerned about my well-being if you weren't trying to throw me off a stupid cliff."

"You. Are. Going. To. Learn. How. To. Fly." Kikyou declared, punctuating every word with a shove. "For all you know you might enjoy it."

"They say I might enjoy sex too, you don't see me running around doing it though," Aki retorted aiming to embarrass the miko.

"Normally the people that say that are trying to get you in trouble," Kikyou responded with an extra firm push. "This is different."

They were actually getting pretty close to the edge. Aki could peer into the abyss without leaning forward now. "How is this different?"

"I'm trying to prevent you from being in the kind of trouble that can be fatal," Kikyou gasped with effort.

"You mean like being pushed off a cliff?" Aki asked with sardonic humor.

"Well, yeah I guess so," Kikyou muttered.

A giant red-eyed youkai lumbered into the clear area near the cliff's edge. "GIVE ME THE SHIKON NO KAKERA!" he demanded.

Aki and Kikyou completely ignored him. For Aki, Kikyou was the more immediate danger. Kikyou was already dead and determined not to give Aki the chance to get out of this.

"You will fly!"

"Someday maybe, but I'm not going to waste my time trying to learn now!"

"Um guys?" Fred tried to get their attention. He really didn't want Aki dead and looking at the big youkai they were ignoring, it would be difficult to prevent that outcome if they didn't start paying attention.

One of the reasons some creatures ventured to evolve into such large bodies is due to their extreme desire for attention and their distaste for being ignored. Once they achieved a size in which they could demand the attention they craved with violence, they are normally content because no one is stupid enough to ignore them…

That is not to say that they will take being ignored in anyway gracefully or with any kind of tolerance. Exceptionally large, dim-witted youkai are no exception. They _really_ don't like being ignored.

See the thing about large youkai getting angry is that they are a great deal stronger than large angry animals. So when large youkai are moved to violence, whole mountains stand up and pay quivering attention.

Or in Aki and Kikyou's case, a great big chunk of the cliff face would quiver and attempt to run away.Unfortunately it just happened to be the chunk of cliff they were standing on.

Aki glanced at Kikyou, "Please tell me, we did not just feel that."

Her answer was the slow motion shifting of the ground at their feet as the trees and the giant began to tilt away from them. "Now would be a really good time to fly," Kikyou shouted.

"If we live through this, remind me to smack you," Aki growled as she latched onto Kikyou's arm and leapt away from the giant rock that used to be a part of the cliff face.

Five seconds later they were still falling. "Are you going to even try flying or do you want me to call my Shinidamachuu?" Kikyou demanded quite annoyed to still be falling.

"If I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it my way, now shut up and enjoy the ride," Aki hollered against the rushing wind.

"I will when you actually do something!" the miko yelled. Aki just snorted and ignored her.

"I'm afraid I have to agree with the miko on this one," Fred announced near her ear.

"Fred!" Aki blinked in surprise. "How are you managing to keep up?"

"I grabbed a hold of the miko's soul since I can do that," Fred answered.

"The 'miko' has a name and still demands that Aki do something if she's going to!" Kikyou interrupted him.

Aki sighed exasperatedly, "Oh fine then." She snapped her wings out and steered them into a graceful loop back up to the top of the cliff.

"What are you doing?" Kikyou gasped as Aki performed a mid air turn that would save them from flying upside down at the top of their arching maneuver.

"I'm double checking that big youkai for Shikon no kakera," Aki answered absently. "I want to be sure before we leave."

"You going to lead this one somewhere it'll be less disruptive?" Fred inquired.

"You think there's anywhere else less populated, with less to destroy that we can get to without crossing into more populated areas?" Aki asked rhetorically. "No shard."

"You knew how to fly, didn't you?" Kikyou accused her ride.

Aki raised an eyebrow and with an otherwise flat look answered her, "I knew the mechanics of it. And I kind of fly when I run, but this is absolutely the first time I've full out flown with my wings."

"How do you steer without tail feathers?" Fred asked out of the blue.

"I'm just gifted that way," Aki declared without really answering the question. "Kikyou, you might want to call your pet youkai."

"Why? You're flying just fine," Kikyou wondered aloud.

"Because something might decide to fly up here and eat me and I'd like both hands free in that event," Aki answered evenly, "And all that clay is damned heavy!"

Kikyou threw her a rather offended look as Aki struggled not to drop her. The miko sighed and ordered up her shinidamachuu. "Remind me to smack you when we're back on the ground," she grumbled.

Aki gave her a half-smile before dropping Kikyou into the tangled nest of blue-white bodies. "Then I guess I'll just have to fly until we both forget. It's just as well, I like flying and I'm not likely to do it much in the future."

"Why not?" Fred asked from where he still clung to his grasp on Kikyou's soul.

"Not a lot of places available to launch from. At least not for a body my size," Aki answered. She was getting the hang of judging air currents and thermal updrafts.

"True, you're not exactly the size of a bird are you?" Fred observed.

Before Kikyou could get her own weighted revenge, Aki laughed and said, "It's a lot harder to launch a house than a little bird!"

The ghost laughed as the flying youkai sailed ahead of them and began to attempt trick maneuvers.

"Can't this mass of serpents go any faster?" Fred grumped at the miko.

"I don't know? How much do souls weigh?" Kikyou asked coyly.

"It doesn't matter, even if souls _do_ weigh something, though I don't believe they do, you've got a great deal more of them than I do," Fred answered maliciously.

"What impairment was Aki suffering from when she decided to let you stay around her?" Kikyou wondered.

"You don't know a damned thing about me or her and I'd prefer it to stay that way. Aki may be willing to forgive a lot because you're already dead and can't succumb to her – "

"Fred," Aki called to the ghost. "Check this out!" She dived down steeply, only snapping her wings open at the last possible second so that she could trail her fingers in the water of the large lake they had been passing over.

"Damnit! Aki! You better be damn glad I can't have heart failure," Fred hollered. His shout was answered with snickering laughter as she continued to flit across the star-studded sky. "If it wasn't so irreversible I'd kill her!"

"As if I would allow that," Kikyou sneered.

"Like you have any say," Fred growled.

"I could always 'eat' you,'" Kikyou cast a sideways glance his way.

"I'd like to see you try it!" Fred glared back. "There's no telling what Aki would do in such an event."

"She'd probably thank me," Kikyou replied haughtily.

"I don't think the indigestion would be worth it," Aki called as she flew circles around them playfully before sailing ahead of them once again.

Both the dead people interpreted Aki's statement in a way that made them look superior to the other.

To Kikyou, Aki had clearly meant that Fred was such a horrible person as to taste extremely bad and disagree with Kikyou's constitution. The last also left the miko feeling as if the youkai had kindly indicated she was delicate in someway.

Fred's interpretation was vastly different. He believed that the statement meant that his very awesomeness as a person would prove too much for the stupid soul eater. If Kikyou did manage to consume him, he would find someway to give her a hard time from the inside and the ghost was certain that Aki knew that.

"What are you smirking about? Aki clearly agrees with me," Kikyou declared sweetly.

"You need to clean your ears out because Aki was definitely indicating that she preferred me," Fred replied snootily.

"My but you are delusional," Kikyou mocked him. "Perhaps when you died you completely lost your ability to see the truth right in front of you."

"I can't help it if your soul eating has left you deranged, but it's clear that the truth is on my side," Fred replied condescendingly.

"I don't get what you have against me. I don't believe we've ever met before Aki, so when could all this anger have come from? Unless you truly are deranged yourself," Kikyou responded sympathetically.

"He's not angry, just jealous," Aki corrected the miko as she came within range. "He dislikes that you can touch and feel and smell when he can't. And what I meant was that saving me wouldn't be worth the effort of trying to eat Fred." And she flew off again.

"I am not jealous!" Fred bellowed. Aki's dismissive laughter floated back at him in response.

"Why does she say stuff like that?" Kikyou asked the air.

"Aki is in a lot of emotional and psychological pain," Fred muttered in explanation. "She suffered a great deal of loss and seen too much blood and death. She's afraid to reach out and care about others because they will probably suffer the same fate. It's leaving her in a crippled state that she can't find her way out of." Kikyou blinked. "She needs to be able to open up and air out the wounds she's sustained, find a new life to live and she needs help to do it. Which is why she's so willing to be slightly open with you," Fred snorted. "She figures you're already dead so she's not likely to kill you by being friendly or spending time with you. But you're not going to be able to help just because of what you are. Like a rock helping a gazelle to fly, it just won't work. Aki needs some one to love and care about her, not more sorrow and pain. She needs someone genuinely concerned about her, not just a habitual tending of injuries. She needs the warmth of Friendship from a living breathing person that won't be killed through her loving them. She doesn't need vengeance or hate and you can't be anything else," he glared at Kikyou.

"That is quite a dilemma," Kikyou acknowledged. "If she is that damaged, healing cannot be done with the dead or with memories of better times. At this moment, there is no one who can give what she needs," the miko stated, "therefore I will make sure she lives until there is."

Fred blinked at the miko before glancing away from her, "Alright then, truce?"

"I doubt it, but the thought is appreciated," Kikyou mocked him.

"Fine then, but don't come crying to me the next time you get beat down," Fred smiled.

"You do realize that you have yet to actually achieve that particular maneuver, right? Personally, I believe it is rather impossible for someone as slow as yourself to do," Kikyou gave him a condescending smirk. "I've known snails that are faster."

"Oh ouch! Cheap shot to the soul," Fred muttered. "Fine, make fun of the fact that ghosts don't move quickly. You're just lucky I'm a gentleman otherwise I might comment on the puffiness that appears around your middle every time you eat."

"Such delusions,' Kikyou shook her head. "You're no more a gentleman than Aki is a grain of sand."

"My but you're a small thinker, for all you know, we are all grains of sand in someone's far greater universe," Fred suggested.

"Such nonsense, but if we are all grains of sand, then you're still not a gentleman and quite assuredly a piece of dirt," Kikyou returned.

"Yeah but then so are you."

"I already knew I was made of dirt," Kikyou replied nonchalantly. "It is a clay body after all."

"I –" he began then failed to come up with something.

"Face it Fred, she got you," Aki laughed.

"Never!" the ghost denied.

"Now kiss and make up," Aki laughed and flew away from the sputtering pair again.

"Do we really have to?" Kikyou asked the ghost.

"Knowing Aki, probably." Fred shrugged, consciously refusing to explain to the miko that they didn't have to actually kiss. "Hey look on the bright side, at least I'm intangible."

"So?"

"So you're not likely to feel much and you won't actually touch me," but Fred would. Now it might seems strange that Fred would be willing to kiss the soul-eater he so despised previously, but when you really think about it, it makes a strange kind of sense. The ghost could actually feel Kikyou, and when you can't feel anything else, you take every opportunity to feel what you can.

Fred settled closer to the miko and leaned down to kiss her. It was awkward at first, but once they got started…well Kikyou did ask for more. And Fred was so floored by the strangely intense sensation of it that he obliged without a second thought.

"Hey you guys! I said kiss and make up, not make out," Aki teased playfully, embarrassing them both. With a laugh she rolled down to skim a few leaves off the upper most branches of some trees before soaring higher.

"No one would blame us if we killed her right?" Kikyou growled while blushing like mad (or as mad as a dead woman could).

"It's perfectly justified," Fred coughed, hiding his own ghostly blush.

Their eyes slightly gravitated towards each other before rocketing away from the brief contact.

"That was…" Kikyou began. She didn't bother to finish it out loud. It had been better than kissing Inuyasha, better than arguing with Fred, more like being alive than being alive had been and it left her feeling flushed and flustered and definitely confused."

"Yes it was…" Fred replied embarrassed. How to ask for more? So much more. After all, he was only male and Kikyou was likely the only action he'd get for a long time. True there was more to this than there ever was with any of his girl friends, but he'd never admit it.

Aki swung her tail down between their faces as she flew off laughing at their awkwardness.

"Kill her now?" Fred Asked.

Kikyou nodded, "Right now," as she urged the shinidamachuu to move faster in pursuit.

The leaves Aki had dislodged in her playful flight floated serenely through the air to land on a youkai who wasn't having a very good day. The demon's enraged red eyes tracked the figure that mocked his inability to move. There she danced across the sky with the joy of free movement while he was too weak to do more than growl with displeasure.

He glared as her laughter rang through his ears taunting him with how far beyond his hardship she was, blissfully moving about free of his injuries and pain, beyond his reach. He snarled his immense distaste for the situation. He truly was having a string of bad luck recently.

First he had his arm cut off by his detestable half-breed younger brother. As if that wasn't bad enough, he had hallucinated and invented himself an impossible human female to tend and annoy him. And when his imagined companion had taken off he'd torn after her in a rage only to find himself badgered by the real, uneducated and smelly, thing. But he got over that, even dismissing the nagging questions about how his weary mind could have come up with such a unique and contrary character on its own.

Then he went after Tessaiga a second time and again failed to claim it. What's more, the whelp's human miko wench had landed a hit on him. That girl had tweaked his curiosity briefly, reminding him slightly of his imagined healer. But she wasn't a match and his fevered brain won out on creating an impossible character.

Then he'd tried for the sword again, only to have its fiercest attack used on his person. Sesshoumaru's own worthless sword had awaken to save his life but failed to do more than that. What a truly worthless piece of junk! He'd get rid of it if it hadn't belonged to his fool of a father.

Sesshoumaru thanked whoever was responsible for small favors that his father's folly was not an inherent part of his bloodline, though Inuyasha was striving to prove that false.

Now that Sesshoumaru was forced to sit still from weakness yet again, he found himself almost wishing for the return of his eccentric hallucination from his last weakness to take care of him and distract him. This time, there was only a shy little human child who would do no more than smile and bring him food he would not eat. He could tell she needed it more than he did and her silent adoration set him on edge.

She didn't talk, didn't argue with him. She had no crazy ideas to tell him. There was no mysteriously safe guarded warmth to this girl. The child wore her heart on her sleeve and it was plain to see when she'd been hurt.

Sesshoumaru was still holding out hope that the child would turn out to be yet another hallucination like the first had been, but it wasn't likely. The first had been so impossible that this child didn't seem to be from the same source by her very normalcy.

The playful flyer was slowly slipping out of his view and he found himself wishing she wouldn't leave. For all that he was angry at his inability to lash out and ground her, he wanted her to remain at least where he could see her. The flyer and her companions reminded him somewhat of his impossible healer and with her around he at least had something to think about that was slightly pleasant.

In his secret heart of hearts, his strange imaginary friend had seemed more and more appealing as time went by. Sadly, he'd never been visited by that hallucination again.

Sesshoumaru shook himself mentally. Such madness. Perhaps his father's folly really was passed down to his offspring. What a terribly awful thought!


	4. Rejected Pokemon

YAY YAY YAY! IT's time for another installment of COTF: ROTL! And each one is more fun than the last. This time around, I'm subjecting Kouga to the insanity. and those weird Bird thingies are in here too.

And on a completely different note, I'm going to ACEN! It starts in two days and I'll be there and in costume as Sumomo from Chobits. that's right, I'll be (probably) the only freckle-faced one there. If you see me, say hi. IF you see my courier style Fruits Basket bag, you are in the presence of this and one other fanfic, in its infancy. Feel free to give encouragement, but all demands for me to write more and quicker must be submitted in the form of a composition book. Heehee! Those are what I write in. I can take them anywhere, and writing things out by hand forces me to go back and edit when i type them up. Otherwise, I don't bother. Nyah!

I'd also like to take this time to seriously thank my one reviewer. You totally rock! You've proven that my fic is good, and everybody else is just lazy! Feel free to ask more questions if you're confused at any time. I'll be sure to post the answers quick as a snap!

And finally, we managed to put down the Inu cast strike. I mean seriously, why do they need me to feed them?

**Rejected Pokémon**

It is often the case that two people involved in a love/hate relationship will be terribly entertaining to watch. There are whole sitcoms, movies and quite a few books that grew successful based solely on this phenomenon.

Being dead and several hundred years before the advent of such sitcoms and books in no way detracted from the entertainment value of such a couple. Being often sucked into the middle of their arguments against your will did.

What's more, the very fact that Aki had never been particularly partial to such stories completely removed any enjoyment she might otherwise have derived from Fred and Kikyou's company. That is, if she would allow herself to stay in their company long enough for them to do more than a cursory attempt to draw her into the middle of their frequent arguments before running so quickly as to leave them behind to continue arguing or get past whatever had caused the disagreement on their own.

Generally, Aki's swift desertion of the pair would inevitably lead to their favorite argument over which one of them was more to blame for driving the poor woman into avoiding them In the first place.

In short, Aki spent most of her time leaping from tree to tree far ahead of her two dead companions just as she was right now. That is, until she missed a tree and landed on a rising feather.

Aki blinked down at the humongous feather that was somehow holding her weight above the ground despite all sane logic and the efforts of gravity to the contrary.

"Who are you?" A loud voice muttered, wonderment leeching all demand from the question.

Aki was truly amazed at the number of physical laws this damn feather was breaking before adding the ability to carry two adult-sized females into the picture.

The red-eyed woman's eyes hardened as she again demanded Aki identify herself. "Who are you?"

"I often wonder that myself as of late," Aki smiled. "So much of me has changed in so short a period of time it is growing very difficult to tell what is me now, and what is me no longer. But as you didn't know me then anymore than you know me now I suppose I could give you my call-name if you would deign to give me yours."

The feather rider blinked half in confusion and half in frustration. "That doesn't make any sense at all."

"Sure it does, but you'd have to take it one sentence at a time and piece together its meaning at your own pace," Aki replied.

"Are you always so difficult when asked a simple question?" The strange youkai asked not really knowing what to make of her sudden guest.

"Only after spending several days with horribly contentious dead people as my only company," Aki replied with a shrug.

"You're terribly strange," the dark haired youkai declared.

"I never claimed to be normal. Besides you're one to talk, you fly around on a feather," Aki crossed her arms comfortably.

"Well I already knew I wasn't normal," the stranger grumbled.

"You wouldn't want to be normal anyway," Aki snorted, "it's over rated. You'd have to wear the same things as everybody else, talk like everybody else, think like everybody else. Being a conformist is just another name for inmate in the prison that is societal opinion. Normal is almost as rotten as being popular. It's tiresome and a tighter prison than your basic normality."

"I never thought of it that way," the stranger blinked.

"Most people don't," Aki shrugged. "Then again, a lot of people like the security of knowing what is allowable and what isn't. Free thinkers in the wrong situation threaten that and can incite people to rioting and lynching." She glanced over the scenery pensively, "It also depends on the type of free thinker as well. Violent rebels are more likely to incite violence than peaceful ones."

"Like calls to like," the feather dipped in a rather strong current of air.

"Exactly." Aki nodded. "So what are you doing? You do seem to have some purpose you know and if you keep moving in this direction I'll be forced to leave you."

"I'm following orders," the stranger spat angrily. "I am the wind! But I am forced to submit to a harness."

Aki blinked, "Okay then, Windy. Are these orders so distasteful to you? What are they anyway?"

"My name is Kagura!" Her red eyes flashed.

"I'm known as Aki to most," Aki replied nonchalantly.

Kagura blinked. "My orders are to find an undead Miko and basically harass her."

"No wonder you're not pleased," Aki commented dryly. "Kikyou's already in a bad mood, what with Fred harassing her about 'doing things'. In fact they haven't done more than argue for days."

"It does not matter, orders are orders," Kagura sighed.

"Perhaps," Aki declared flippantly. "But forewarned is forearmed as I was often told when I was younger."

"True," Kagura nodded her thanks.

"In any case, I'm avoiding the both of them so this is where I get off," Aki smiled and prepared to launch herself from the feather.

"Wait," Kagura grabbed her arm. "You're not worried about me hurting your companions?"

Aki snorted, "they're already dead, what could you do? Fred doesn't have a corporeal form to hurt and Kikyou's a frigging miko. Really, what is there to worry about?"

Kagura didn't know whether to be insulted or relieved, she kind of liked this strange unassuming youkai. "Luck to you."

"Freedom to you," Aki replied with a half smile.

"Is that what your people say to each other?" Kagura asked confusedly. She'd never heard anyone wish someone freedom before.

"No, but it's much more meaningful to wish you something you want." And then Aki launched herself off the feather into the air.

Thanks to the elevation of Kagura's feather, Aki was actually able to take flight, and since the wind was with her, she covered quite a lot of ground in the direction of a somewhat rocky region kept company by a waterfall and a pack of rather scruffy looking wild wolves. Wolves who were having a small bit of trouble with an airborne assailant that looked rather like a demented flying jigglypuff with humanoid horns sticking out of their foreheads.

Aki really didn't know what to make of the situation as crazy wolf-speaking human-looking figures broke onto the scene on the side of the wolves and laid into the flying pokemon rejects quite viciously. In all honesty, she was quite content to stay back and watch until she knew which side deserved her help and whether or not she wanted to bother getting involved.

And she would've got away with it too if it weren't for that green baseball wannabe attacking her, as one of the flying fiends had spotted her and gave chase.

"Well, da-yam!" Aki muttered, as she inevitably got up close and ugly with the gravity-defying monstrosity. Did this thing ever smell bad or what? It was the smell of a chicken coop that hadn't been cleaned out for too long and had managed to produce and crack half a dozen rotten eggs to boot. "I do believe you," she grunted as she smacked the thing into the waterfall with the back of her skillet, "could use a bath!"

The ball of outraged drenched feathers and scales hissed at her as it launched itself at her rather haphazardly. It managed to slam her into the hard rocky ground with the full force of its clumsy weight, trapping both her and it on the ground while the chaos of the altercation around them continued.

Aki may not have been formally trained in any form of martial arts, but she had a mean kick and knew how to throw a good punch and when the situation called for it, as it did now, she could claw and bite with the best of them.

Somehow, the thing managed to catch her left arm in its mouth and clamped its teeth on her shoulder. Aki screamed more in surprised than anything else and released her miko powers into its maw without a single thought. The bird of paradise's left cheek burst out the side of its face like a balloon filled with watery red goo and thicker things.

"Oh Ew! Bleh!" Aki gasped in disgust at the taste it left in her mouth. She rushed to the clear waters under the waterfall and dove in depositing her miraculously clean shoulder bag on the shore on the way. Really how did that thing always manage to remain completely out of the path of whatever blood, gore or what have you, even while she couldn't? She dove into the water without any real thought to the consequences and furiously began to scrub the reddish goop off her skin and hair.

When she resurfaced, she was just in time to see the wolves and their men finish off her attacker. Aki shook her head; the crazy bird ball's death really had been inevitable she just had to convince herself of that. It wasn't her fault. This death hadn't been because of her. Nope and Fred would take up ballet and play the sugar plum fairy next Christmas. She snorted, but it would've been something to see.

Aki hauled herself out of the cool water near where she'd launched herself into it only to find a bevy of wolves sniffing around her bag. She must be going up in the world, before it was just one dog at a time, now she was surrounded by an entire pack of wolves. What was it with her and canines?

"Hey, fluff balls, do step away from the bag, I kind of need to get into it," Aki grumped at the milling pack of wolves good-naturedly

"Oi Bitch! Show them some respect!" a gruff voice demanded. "Who are you and what are you doing in my territory."

Aki ignored him in favor of focusing more on walking through the pack of wolves to get to her bag. "What is it you guys always seem to find so fascinating about my bag? I mean really, it's just a bag." She wondered out loud. This was kind of like walking through tall furry grass, only the grass had enough strength and substance to knock her on her ass if she didn't pay attention.

The fur-clad speaker from before gave off a rather menacing growl before launching an attack at her head. Aki would've liked to say she ducked on her own, but in all truth she really hadn't noticed the attack. Her dodge out of the way at that moment was manufactured by an accidental bad step that caused her to roll her ankle and give the wolves an opening to knock her flat on the ground. Then the real attack came with curious wet noses and affectionate licks.

"Oh stop it! You big bunch of overgrown puppies!" Aki let out a strained laugh. "That tickles!"

"Oi! Bitch I'm talking to you!" the furry-skirt-with-tail wearing guy growled at her again.

Aki was a bit busy shoving the amorous four-legged animals away from her so she could rise up off the ground. "I live," She mock gasped as she came to her feet above the fog of fur around her calves. "Damn," she muttered, "too bad Fred wasn't around, he would've gotten a kick out of that."

The strange guy's growl escalated into a snarl of outrage. His two companions fought to restrain him, pleading with him to contain his anger. "C'mon Kouga," the one whined slightly, despairing at his pleas possible effectiveness. "There's no need to attack her. She's obviously on our side if the Birds attacked her too."

"Yeah Kouga," the other pleaded, "Besides the pack brothers seem to like her. Maybe she's just deaf and means no disrespect," He finished rather hopefully.

"Sorry, buyos," Aki cut in after finally having retrieved her bag and the towel it contained, "But neither of your arguments holds any merit." She flicked some of the excess water from her hair. "Just because we happened to have been attacked by the same batch of yoyos doesn't make us the best of friends." Kouga growled a little louder, "And by now I've proven I'm not deaf. I just refuse to suffer an interrogation before being allowed to get cleaned up and dried off, thank you very much! And I figured that somebody who smelled that strongly of Kagome would understand that!"

"Kagome-nee-san!" The two restraining youkai gasped in surprise just as Kouga's sharp growl was abruptly cut short.

"How do you know my Woman?" Kouga demanded.

"I doubt very much that Kagome actually agreed to that rubbish," Aki commented dryly.

"She really does know Kagome-nee-san," one of the two murmured to the other.

Kouga glared at his two companions, forcing them to cower in fear of his wrath. "Answer the Question!" my but he's impatient.

"Gee you're so charming," Aki muttered "I can see how Kagome couldn't help but be swayed into a high opinion of you. You must've had to beat her off with a stick." Aki ran the towel over her hair again, wondering if she should just change her clothes before judging Kouga's face to be quite enraged enough by her evasion of the question. She sighed tiredly before answering the question; "I was Kagome's tutor, once upon a time."

Kouga looked her up and down with disbelief. "I can't believe that my Kagome would actually take lessons from someone like you," he declared disgustedly.

Now just what the hell did he think she taught? Aki let out a few choice phrases in her native language. What was with all of Japan? Did she somehow miss the seminar where all women tutors in the feudal era were whores? "Now just what the hell are you thinking?" She demanded in Japanese. "I was her Language tutor. I taught her my native language!" Then she added a particularly vicious insult in French just for good measure.

"Keh, what would a woman know about Languages?" Kouga was stupid enough to ask without thinking about it.

Aki chuckled, "Who uses speech more than a woman? I don't see many _men_ gathering to gossip anywhere I go do you? And I don't see men spending all the time around children that it would take to teach them proper language." She added another insult in yet another language just for good measure.

"What the hell gibberish do you keep saying about me?" Kouga demanded getting seriously suspicious.

Aki just smiled sweetly, "What does it matter, you over-bearing pain in the ass?"

"Wench!"

"Jack ass!"

"Bitch!"

"Cur!"

"I'M NOT A DOG! THAT'S DOG TERD!" Kouga screamed.

Aki blinked, "Who?"

"Ah, Kouga," one of the other two wolf-youkai tried to interrupt.

"Shut up!" the wolf prince bellowed.

Aki chuckled softly, "Really it's been fun and all that, but we do need to get down to why Kagome would leave you with your jewel shards."

That got their attention. "What do you mean?"

"Well, from what I can see, Kouga has two of them," Aki replied blandly. "One shard in each leg. I can only think that Kagome left them there for one of two reasons," Aki absently secured her bag over her should and draped the towel over top of it to dry. "One reason is that she could've decided that they were perfectly alright where they were and she left them because she'd at least know where they were. Another reason would be that you kidnapped Kagome and the shards and her friends were just so glad to save Kagome they left the shards behind happy enough to know where they were."

One of Kouga's companions whispered to the other "She's not too far off about the kidnapping thing, is she?" To which the other told him rather firmly to shut up before Kouga heard him.

"In either case there's no way to verify it is there?" Aki thought out loud.

"You can see the Jewel shards?" Kouga was incredulous. To think there was actually two women running around that could actually see where the shards were. Still, given the choice, Kagome was still his pick. She at least wasn't so blatantly…well um, like this one.

Aki held up her tinkling case of Shikon fragments, "If I couldn't, these would've been a lot harder to find."

"Hand them over!" Kouga demanded. If he captured more shards and presented them to Kagome… hey she might just like him the right way. Yeah, keep telling yourself that.

"I will not! I don't know if you stole those shards you've got from Kagome and I worked too hard to find these." Aki wrapped her fingers around the film tube more firmly.

"And we don't know if you're really a friend of Kagome's or not! You could be lying about being her tutor or whatever you claimed you were. For all we know you're like Naraku, planning to take over the world when nobody's looking," Kouga declared pompously. He really was putting his whole heart into relieving Aki of her shards as a way to gain Kagome's favor.

"What would I want with a world?" Aki snorted. "It's a rotten horrible place and you can keep it!"

"That's what you want us to think!" Kouga yelled.

"Oh please! That argument didn't even work for Shippou! And he's a lot cuter than you," As if cuteness had anything to do with the stupidity of the argument.

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Maybe I just thought you'd be smart enough to realize how stupid it sounded, my mistake."

"So where does that leave us?" The male with the patch over his eye asked.

"Damned if I know?" his brother replied.

"It means we'll have to settle this some other way," Aki sighed.

"Bring it on!" Kouga growled cockily, expecting a fight.

"How about a race?" Aki suggested.

"A…Race?" Kouga's jaw dropped.

"You want to _race_ Kouga?" Ginta Asked flabbergasted.

"That's what I said isn't it?" Aki shrugged. "Really I thought the stupidity was limited only to him," she pointed at Kouga.

"Watch it, Bitch!"

"Flea bag!"

"You really want to race?" Hakkaku asked her again.

"Yep," Aki replied evenly. "Half my shards against half your shards."

"Are you kidding?" Ginta blinked in further disbelief. "You have a great deal more Shikon than Kouga does."

"Shut up!" Kouga snarled.

Aki nodded, "I don't think I'll lose. You can even use your shards if you want."

"Why only half the Shikon shards? Why not all of them?" Kouga demanded.

"I already told you, I put too much effort into getting my hands on these. To wager them all on one race would be foolish," Aki replied evenly.

"So you think you'll lose," Hakkaku said.

"I'm acknowledging the possibility of that outcome. Only a fool wouldn't honestly consider the chance of failure. But I don't think it'll happen," Aki shrugged. "A tie is more likely than me outright losing. In that event neither one of us actually gains or loses anything."

"As if you could actually keep up with me," Kouga asserted smugly, rather firm in the belief of his own ability.

"I don't know why I wouldn't be able to," Aki said blandly. "I've yet to meet a youkai that I couldn't dance circles around."

"Yeah, but this is the first time you've met Kouga," Ginta pointed out.

"And those other youkai were first time acquaintances too," Aki returned. "Really, you shouldn't try to restrain strange youkai who have challenged you in a seemingly foolish manner that appears to be mostly in your favor. I mean, as awesome as I think you are for trying to do right by me, I should point out that it's your friend you think has the advantage and your friend's good fortune will transmit to you in one way or another I should think. Trying to convince me not to put forth such a large portion of the Shikon as a wager or to talk me out of the race completely isn't the wisest thing you could be doing at this time. It's certainly nice of you, but hardly wise."

Ginta and Hakkaku blinked at each other in surprise. They hadn't thought of it that way.

Aki smiled at their bewilderment. "Well at least I know you won't let either of us cheat." Indeed they were much too stupid to think that they could allow one or the other of them to win falsely. "Which is good because somebody's going to have to monitor and referee this crazy race."

"You're dead serious about this crazy race aren't you?" Kouga couldn't believe it. Most people, human and/or youkai, would just fight this out. "You definitely have to be a friend of Kagome's," he muttered softly to himself.

Aki didn't bother to comment on anything the wolf youkai said. Partially because they answered themselves and partially because it was better they weren't aware of just how good her hearing actually was. Instead she went about setting up the racecourse and rules. "See that tree way over there?" she pointed to a lone bush like tree that stood some distance away. "Whoever manages to get there and back wins. The rules are simple enough. Run your fastest, run around the tree, and cross the line first. You may take whatever route you want and you must stay on the ground. No flying. And there's really no need for blows, checking into rock surfaces, and so on." Aki had quite pleasantly made it this far without actually suffering the evil witches spell, she'd like that to continue. "And since these two honorable gents are so concerned about me being cheated or swindled, they'll be here watching the finish line and watching for us to round that tree. They get to judge who won if for some reason it happens to be a close race."

"It most certainly won't be a close race!" Kouga boasted. "I'll be leaving you drowning in my dust!"

"Alright then," Aki shrugged off her shoulder bag. "If you two gentlemen would be so kind as to start us off."

Ginta glanced at Hakkaku and Hakkaku glanced at Ginta. Since when were they considered gentlemen? Together they shrugged in unison as Ginta stepped up to draw a line in the moist dirt at their feet.

Kouga came up to the line eager to have this sorry excuse for a race over with already. This wasn't worth the time they were wasting on it. It was a foregone conclusion that he would win the race. No question about it.

Aki stayed a few steps behind the line. She really didn't see a reason to act like this was going to be a particularly difficult race. Nor did she desire to get too close to any of the males, the urasue may be dead, but it was better to be cautious.

Hakkaku stood on the other end of the line Ginta had drawn and studied the strange female bouncing on the balls of her feet behind Kouga. She was very strange, to be sure, but he still couldn't figure out why Kouga couldn't accept that she was a friend of Kagome who was just as strange.

"Ready?" Ginta asked.

Both nodded in a manner befitting their respective temperaments and mood.

"Start!" Ginta and Hakkaku ordered together.

And the space in front of them was empty. The two wolf youkai turned to watch the two contestants speed towards the distant tree. Kouga was running full tilt as always, his form and posture so very familiar to them. But hers…the strange youkai female appeared to be easily keeping up with Kouga's determined pace and all while maintaining the air of merely taking a leisurely stroll to keep neck and neck with him.

"You think she's pacing him just so that he'll be sure to see her get to the tree at the same time as him?" Ginta asked his companion quietly.

"As difficult as it is to believe, I think that's just what she's doing. She's making sure he sees that she didn't cheat just as surely as she's making sure we know it." Hakkaku commented to his brother in awe.

The milling wolves at their feet whined in boredom. They couldn't understand why their youkai kin refused to recognize what they sensed so easily. She was powerful, yes. She was strange, yes. But she was gentle and good. They knew this, could sense it almost instinctually.

"They've rounded the tree," Ginta commented.

"Look at her go!" Hakkaku exclaimed in disbelief.

Kouga was still running as he always did, full tilt and too fast to really see, but Aki was quickly leaving him behind. She ran so fast the dust didn't have the chance to stir up in answer to her passing, so they could clearly see the rampant disbelief painting Kouga's face.

Aki began to dig in her heals to slow herself down long before she crossed the finish line and she still skid past them and into the shallows of the pool of water she had previously dunked her self in. "Safe," she shouted somewhat playfully. Nobody understood what she was getting at, so the word didn't meet with the smiles and humor it might've somewhen else.

Kouga finished as she stepped out of the water. "I can't believe you beat me," he blinked rapidly. It wasn't possible was it? He had the shards; no one should be able to beat him.

"I'll collect my winnings from you at a later date," Aki declared dismissively. "Winners privilege, I collect when I choose. And I don't need them just yet." To be totally honest, she had decided before the race that these guys weren't bad guys and that Kagome had quite probably left them on purpose. The two wolf brothers and this Kouga guy himself had proved that they both knew Kagome as a friend by both their actions and their side comments to themselves. Comments they hadn't thought she could hear.

"All that and you're just going to leave the prize here?" Ginta asked rather confused.

Aki grinned, "There you go again, trying to talk me into taking away from you instead of being generous."

The wolf brother blushed, chagrined.

"Don't worry about it though," Aki picked up her bag. "You can't persuade me out of my seeming insanity," she smiled. "Bye-bye boys." She turned and began to run away from them.

Kouga stared after the crazy female, still flabbergasted at his loss. He couldn't lose; it just couldn't be possible. He had the shards, he used the shards, and he hadn't gone easy on her either. How could she have won? "She must have cheated," Kouga's eyes narrowed in thought as he mumbled his first thought of denial aloud. "That's it! She cheated! Get back here bitch! Lets have an honest rematch, you cheating wench!"

Ginta looked at Hakkaku, Hakkaku looked at Ginta and both sighed. The wolf brothers and the pack of milling wolves watched after Kouga as their leader took off to chase down the female that had the speed and gall to beat their mighty prince in a fair race.

Wearily they chased after the wolf youkai set on a mission for a rematch.


	5. A Run Through the Forest

Whew! It's been something of a hectic week. ACen Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Then I started my new job at Wal-mart on Monday. I'm exhausted. When I'm done at work I come home and babysit while making dinner. And no matter how tired I am, I make myself take a walk even so. The past couple nights I've all but fallen asleep reading my back stories of this fic and one other because I write on my breaks at work. Gotta be sure to keep them plot holes out of the story!

So yeah, expect part three to have a bit of delay on it when we get that far. I'm not typing anything up until I'm more used to my schedule.

BUT! There will be no delay for any chapter of this part of the fic! All the chapters are typed up already and waiting for their issue date. Hurrah! And I am slowly writing more chapters so I will hopefully have it finished someday. prefferrably before you all get tired of it.

ANd do tell me when or if I cross the line into bad fanfiction. I absolutely abhor bad Fanfiction. Tell me what has crossed the line and I'll fix it.

Now on to the chapter I wrote with the characters I have on loan from Rumiko TAkahashi.

And do pay attention to the title, For that's all they really do throughout the whole chapter.

**A Run Through the Forest**

Everyone knows that there is a great deal of time spent in life where nothing meaningful happens. Strange occurrences do not happen everyday no matter whom the day happens to be happening to. Conversely, while strange things do not happen everyday, a lot can happen in a single day and what's more, strange out-of-the-ordinary things tend to happen all at once. It is as if the boring days are there just as a sort of repayment for the days we wish weren't _quite_ so interesting.

So it has been with Aki and her life. Not every day of her life is quite worth chronicling, but most often the days that are worth being reported on tend to happen in clusters, three days here, a week there and a full month of nothing in between. Unfortunately, Aki was in the middle of an extremely long string of interesting days.

She was currently being chased by Kouga-in-denial and heading in whichever direction gifted her with the most space to run, but this situation was much to tame for the fates. No way was this all that was going to happen to her. That would be too kind of Life.

Somewhere ahead of Aki's mad game of run-mousy-run, another interesting situation was unfolding.

He was angry, though his frozen features would never betray his wrath. He had stumbled across his disgusting half-brother's group yet again and of course the situation had degenerated into violence.

Sesshoumaru faced off with his younger sibling and wistfully wished he were anywhere but here. But here he was and here they were and fight they would. It was the way of things. It was rather disgusting how horribly predictable his altercations with the hanyou went.

They would see each other. Insults and yelling would follow until all that was left to settle the encounter was violence of some kind or other. It was boring, routine.

So here he was, his claws extended and dripping with the toxins he'd inherited with his blood.

There was Inuyasha, wielding their honorable father's sword despite his unworthiness of the weapon, taunting Sesshoumaru with his inability to even touch it.

In a blur they raced toward each other for the attack, both smugly certain the other would fall under this supposedly infallible blow.

Sesshoumaru's claws found purchase in a target. He could feel the poison entering the victim of his attack, but the hair that fell over his arm wasn't the silver of his brother Inuyasha. It wasn't even the darkness of the Hanyou's many companions. This hair was gold and it confused him that he could've missed the presence of so strange a creature as had managed to get between Inuyasha and himself at the very moment before their respective blows would have landed properly.

He backed up in stoic confusion, withdrawing his claws from the flesh he had mangled. Bright Green eyes stared up at him empty of any true emotion as Inuyasha likewise withdrew his sword from her side. Something about this creature in front of him tugged at the back of his mind but he dismissed it as unimportant.

The female turned away from him slowly, barely managing to finish her move before gravity and weakness forced her to her knees. "You two okay?" her broken question alerted everyone of the two small figures previously obscured by the tall grass.

Shippou and Rin barely nodded as the shock of how close they'd come to being shish-ka-bobbed slowly sank into their reality. This crazy woman had come out of nowhere to knock them out of the way and take the blow that would have killed them before they even realized they were in danger. And as they watched, her blood flowed into the slowly growing pool underneath her.

Shippou's shock wore off first as his brain began processing what his wide eyes were telling him. "Aki-chan!" he gasped loudly to cover the loud wail that welled up at the back of his throat.

All those present jumped in surprise as the kitsune's exclamation of recognition knocked them out of the brief spell of shocked horror they'd sunk into upon realizing what had nearly been lost in the wake of the brothers' bickering. Kagome rushed over to the kneeling figure of her barely recognizable friend as Aki quickly pushed herself off the ground and stumbled.

Aki corrected herself before anyone could catch her and began to walk away. She needed to keep moving. There was a demon chasing her for a stupid re-race and she refused to drag anyone else into their ridiculous conflict. She stumbled through the tall grace only to fall into the fringe of trees that circled one edge of the inus impromptu battleground. Dizziness assaulted her senses. She suspected that was the poison making itself felt. Kagome caught up to her as she fell against a maple tree.

Kagome reached out to touch the girl and pulled back in surprise as Aki fell the rest of the way to the ground. "Sango! Hurry!" the high school student wailed with worry. Her former tutor was losing consciousness, which was always a bad sign when blood loss was involved.

Kagome reached out again and gasped at the heat pouring off Aki's skin.

"Here you go, Kagome-chan" Sango breathed into the almost-miko's ear as Miroku wandered over on her heals. The monk busied himself by trying to staunch the flow of blood while Kagome rummaged in her pack for bandages and an antidote.

Sesshoumaru followed the humans in mild curiosity and stinging guilt. His Rin had almost been run through by his actions. Without this stranger's timely intervention his darling distraction would be a dead distraction by his own folly. That didn't sit well with him and so he owed this stranger and he would repay her spilled blood. But first, he had to know how to find her later in order to offer such repayment.

The taiyoukai breathed in, tasting the air and searching for the new scent that should be hers. He knew the scents of all the others well enough so the new scent that should be there would be hers. But there was no new smell in the air. The blood scent hung in the air without any identifiers for him to remember. How could this woman-child baffle the senses of the great Sesshoumaru? And in her current condition? He moved to gain a clear view of the female's injured form and was alarmed to see the death phantoms gathering around Rin's savior. These mortals weren't working fast enough! He concealed his exasperation and made his decision. His hand strayed to Tenseiga and it sprang from its sheath with a pleasant ring.

Though he had gained a clear view, he did not have a clear path for Tenseiga to do its work; Inuyasha's blasted wench was in his damn way! Sesshoumaru growled at her to move but the little scamp simply froze. Finally Inuyasha hauled the little human out of the way as the others stepped back to watch him with interest.

Rin tugged absently at his sleeve and he realized, truly realized that he'd nearly lost the little human child. He'd nearly lost her happy chattering and bright laughter. True he could simply have Tenseiga erase her death, but Sesshoumaru was convinced death was not something she needed to re-experience. And he wasn't so convinced that the Tenseiga could work its magic so drastically twice.

He refocused his attention on the woman that had prevented his having to test the reproducibility of the sword's ability and watched as a tear of blood tainted with his toxins fell at an impossibly slow rate towards the ground. She coughed and a trickle of blood crept out the corner of her mouth. Without another thought, Sesshoumaru let the blade slice through the air with all the strength at his command.

The wounds closed almost instantly and her breathing eased. She appeared as if she were only sleeping peacefully.

The group collectively held its breathe as they waited for her to open her emerald eyes.

A sound from the other side of the abandoned battlefield drew Sesshoumaru's attention away from his latest act of apparent charity. Over top the tall grasses swaying in the breeze he could see a rather determined looking miko moving swiftly towards them, or more to the point, towards the slowly rousing stranger that he had just saved. He didn't like this. His instincts almost had him growling ferally before he could suppress it. What was wrong with him? Had Rin's near death and the near death of her savior affected him so much? Before this the inu youkai would have never believed himself capable of being so…easily changed, manipulated, and without anyone actually trying to change him.

Could it be? Could what Inuyasha was seeing be true? Was…Kikyou running…to him? Dare he believe it; dare he even think it? As Inuyasha watched the approaching miko with disbelief and apprehension, he concluded she must be. Why else would she be there? Kikyou approached to within touching distance and Inuyasha opened his previously occupied arms (consequently dropping Kagome on her rear), only to watch as the miko sailed right passed him without even a glance in his direction. He got nothing but an elbow in the ribs from Kagome as he observed Kikyou hurrying to the side of the injured Aki. He harrumphed and said "Feh!"

Kagome rushed to keep a close watch on the undead miko. Kikyou had proven tricky and underhanded in the past and Aki had _just _been brought back to life. It would seem rather stupid to allow someone to just walk up and kill her out of spite after putting forth the effort to bring her back to life.

Amazingly enough, Kikyou was just examining Aki for any lasting health threats. "Baka," Kikyou declared under her breath as she worked. For all that Sesshoumaru's sword had saved Aki's life and closed all her wounds, the flesh that had just been closed was still too tender in the miko's opinion. And the poison was still in Aki's system. If she moved around too much she'd re-open the wounds and the poison would cause yet more damage in slowing her down. Kikyou sighed; the girl was hopeless. She had to smile a little though; it was part of her charm.

Aki pushed herself into a sitting position and winced. She tried to figure out just how the hell it was that she was still painfully breathing. She had been dieing, she was certain of that. But she was now in too much pain to be blissfully dead. What the hell had happened? She shrugged and swiftly regretted the movement. Her eyes opened slowly, letting in the light of day. She took stock of her surroundings through every sense that she had. She didn't miss the amount of blood on the ground, on her clothes, and…ugh! In her hair. She stood up gingerly and glanced down at the miko glowering up at her.

"Hello, Kikyou," She smiled down at the miko. "Still trying to keep me in one piece? I would've thought you'd have given up by now."

Kikyou smiled indulgently, "What, and lose your charming discourse? How would I survive?" She quipped. The miko was amazed by the transformation she saw in herself. Keeping company with Aki and her ghost friend had her feeling more alive than she had ever felt when she actually was alive. Granted Fred could try her patience something awful. "Besides, I enjoy the challenge." She watched Aki's sad eyes as she chuckled.

Aki's soft chuckle caused her to wince painfully. A second later she coughed and caught the blood it brought up in her hand. She ignored the thick liquid and took in a deep breath to test the air for scent herself. "Great," she grumbled quietly, " just what I need." She turned swiftly to Kagome while simultaneously removing a small plastic tube from the bag slung over her shoulder. "Here," she shoved the film tube at Kagome, "Before I forget."

Puzzled Kagome peered at the little container and took a deep breath, "I'd really like to know how you always manage to gather so many shards in so short a period of time," the ninth grader wondered aloud.

"Can you give me the container back?" Aki requested, blatantly ignoring her interest. "I don't have anything else to put them in." She motioned for Kagome to hurry; she didn't want her trouble spilling on the others.

Kagome nearly dropped the shards three times in her hurry due to Inuyasha's many varied antics. She finally got frustrated enough to yell the 'word' at him. He continued to be obnoxious, but in a much less disruptive way since he _was_ plastered to the ground.

Kagome added Aki's contribution of shards to her own cache and handed the film tube back to her waiting former tutor. "There you go," Kagome smiled.

Aki took the little container and put it back in its place before she promptly turned and left

The group left in the clearing could hardly believe her abrupt departure and were quite frozen with their surprise. That is until Kikyou gave out a most uncharacteristic growl and started chasing after Aki and yelling at her to stop and rest.

After a brief glance at everyone else who'd been left behind everyone felt an unexplainable urge to follow. An urge Kagome helped along by wondering briefly aloud why Aki hadn't handed over all the shards in her possession.

Soon Inuyasha, Kagome, Sango, Miroku, Kirara, Shippou, Rin, and Sesshoumaru were chasing after the strange almost pure youkai and the undead miko, for various reasons. The most unclear of which being Sesshoumaru's.

"Oi! Why are you following us? You aren't interested in the shards," Inuyasha called back to his elder brother.

"Indeed," Sesshoumaru answered evenly. It wasn't really an answer. Though the inu youkai hadn't really put forth the thought of intentionally annoying his half-sibling, that's exactly how Inuyasha took it. Sesshoumaru hadn't exactly answered the question, really.

"He's not chasing the shards," Kikyou spoke up condescendingly. "He's following Aki."

"Why would he be interested in Aki?" Shippou asked, slightly bewildered and very suspicious of the undead miko.

"Because Aki doesn't carry scent." Kagome guessed. "Because she saved you and Rin and managed to run this quickly directly after being brought back to life. I mean, don't you think that's interesting?" she asked the kit.

"Well, yeah," Shippou answered, "But I know Aki. I knew her before. I mean he did meet her that one time, but she looked completely different."

Sesshoumaru stared at the kit, silently demanding an explanation for that last comment. Unfortunately Sesshoumaru's stare can be quite quelling to a young kitsune, and Shippou only gulped before instantly shutting up. Mentally the taiyoukai sighed before dismissing the child's statement. Children were so often confusing reality with illusion and dream. For all he knew, this Aki had saved the little kit from him in the boy's nightmares. Sesshoumaru nodded to himself. Yes that had to be it.

They were slowly catching up to their prey since she had seemingly stopped for some reason. Sesshoumaru was inclined to believe the female had stopped due to a sudden wave of weakness. His toxins still were affecting her, though he was sorry about that.

And she _was _suffering from the poison in her body, Aki's dizziness had finally prompted her to stop temporarily but it couldn't make her give up completely. She would not call a stop for rest, especially not with so many following in pursuit for various reasons. What was she, a fox?

"And so we meet again," a vaguely familiar voice called to her from the boughs of a tree 20 feet in front of where Aki rested against another giant of vegetation in unwilling repose.

Aki groaned, was _every_body determined to bother her today? "Hello, Windy," she begrudgingly acknowledged the detachment.

"It's Kagura! Ka-gu-ra!" red eyes flashed with annoyance.

"Right, right," Aki offered to placate the demon. "What do you want Kagura? I'm kind of busy at the moment." Understatement of the era.

"I'm following orders again," Kagura replied grumpily.

"I don't have time for this right now," Aki muttered, rather grumpy herself. I mean really, trying to keep at the head of a rather determined parade of humans, youkai, and certain undead individuals is not a pleasant thing to worry about. More especially when you're trying to somehow keep certain parts of the parade from clashing with certain other parts of the same parade and all while being incapable of doing so in a Johnny-on-the-spot sort of way.

"Orders are orders," Kagura grumped. She was having a bad day too. Naraku had quite pointedly let her know she was expected to goad Aki into following her to his pre-decided point of ambush because she was (in his opinion and greater knowledge) incapable of taking the strange demon on her self. Just taking orders was bad enough, but being declared incompetent to perform a basic snatch and kill maneuver was simply maddening. It was even more upsetting since Kagura hadn't ever fought Aki before, so there was no real basis for his declaration. In fact, Kagura had never seen Aki fight before.

Aki sighed, "Fine. Follow your orders." Then she blinked, "What are your orders exactly?"

Kagura blinked, Forewarned was forearmed and would definitely make her job harder. Then again, Kagura planned to screw this up anyway. Defiance in subtle ways, such a delightful revenge for having to follow orders in the first place. The detachment shook her head at Aki before bringing up her fan and weapon of choice. "Prepare yourself," she offered in warning. She truly did like Aki.

Aki's eyes widened with surprise and trepidation. The first grouping of the pursuit was about to stumble in the middle of her altercation with Kagura. They wouldn't have a chance to realize what was going on before Kagura struck.

The wind user flicked her fan partially open and yelled her attack to Aki, "Fujin no Mai!"

Aki smiled grimly before turning her back on the attack and stretching out her wings to offer cover to her defenseless and bewildered entourage. She grit her teeth as the pain of her sensitive wings wracked through her body.

Shippou gave out a little squeak of fright at watching Kagura's familiar attack approach and impact on the nearly transparent wings held up in front of the group. Lucky for him, Rin's shriek of terror conveniently covered the sound he'd made.

Aki balled her hand into a fist, allowing her claws to draw her own blood as she forced herself to be patient. No attack could last forever. There had to be a pause, a lull, something for her to wait for. And there was. The moment the wind stopped cutting into her, Aki whipped around and sent a ball of her miko power flying at the detachment.

Kagura screamed in surprised pain as the ball rebounded off the tree behind her and splashed holy power in her direction. It was barely a hit at all, but more than enough to send the wind user running in terrified retreat. Really, if she wasn't so terrified she might have realized flying would be quicker.

Aki clenched her shaking and abused hand before taking off herself. Kouga was catching up and that couldn't be good for anybody involved.

He was so close in fact, that the minute Aki disappeared a cloud of dust skidded to a stop in the exact same spot previously filled by the fleeing youkai.

"Oi, Kagome!" the reason for the dust cloud greeted his favorite miko-in-training. "Still keeping company with that dumb dog?"

As always, Inuyasha took instant offense to the wolf's words and demeanor. "Shut up, you wimpy wolf!" the hanyou bellowed. "What are you doing here?" he demanded in accusation.

"I could ask the you the same thing, Dopey Dog!" Kouga continued, not phased in the least.

Kagome smiled forcedly, the kind of smile reminiscent of computer-enhanced images. "Hi, Kouga-kun. What brings you so far from your tribe?" she asked with a little more than polite interest. She really did care what happened to the wolf-youkai tribe. Not to the extent that Kouga an Inuyasha imagined, but there you have it.

Inuyasha's mumbled exclamations and curses went unheard as Kouga replied. "I'm tracking a demon wench who cheated in a race against me. Never thought I'd actually run across my woman, though it is a pleasure."

"She went that way, _Baka_!" Inuyasha broke in pointing after Aki. "What are you waiting for?"

Kouga looked to Kagome for confirmation and she just nodded as the rest of the group took off after Aki again.

Sesshoumaru thought quietly to himself that this female was certainly full of surprises.

"So that's how Aki's been getting Shikon shards without fighting," Shippou thought out loud.

"Well she did say she challenged them to contests and such," Miroku reminded the kit.

"When did you meet Aki?" Kagome asked slightly surprised that the monk actually knew her former tutor.

"It was a while ago," Shippou answered from her shoulder. Miroku nodded from Kirara's back. "He met her right before she left that first big batch of shards with Kaede."

Sesshoumaru kept one ear to their chatter attempting to glean information from them without appearing to care what they were talking about. Rin's grip on his clothing shifted and he glanced down to ensure she was securely attached to his side for this trip. The sudden seductive scent of impersonal blood threaded through the trees to flood his olfactory nerves. It would appear that the wolf-youkai had caught up with Aki and caused her harm. Subconsciously Sesshoumaru sped up his pursuit, unintentionally goading Inuyasha to speed up as well.

In reality, Kouga had caught up with his 'demon wench' all right. He'd caught up with her so well, he'd actually run into her knocking both him and her out of the upper branches of a rather tall tree.

Down, down, down they fell, until Aki briefly wondered if they had somehow managed to fall out of the tree into a canyon that extended far below the roots of the tree. It was such a long drop that the impact with the ground knocked Kouga unconscious and tore open those wounds Kikyou had been so worried about. It was all Aki could do to remain conscious and breathing, and that's how they found them some moments later.

Kagome, Sango, and Kikyou pushed everybody out of the way to get to the injured partial youkai. Kikyou plucked a single hair from Aki and used it to stitch the biggest wound up. Kagome cleaned the wounds to be stitched (or not) with supplies from her pack and Sango prepped the bandages that would be used after the stitching was done and all the wounds were cleaned. She also stood on guard to ward off Miroku should the need arise.

Miroku was quite busy enough with keeping Kouga away from the injured Aki while the girls worked. He eventually persuaded Inuyasha to help him deflect the wolf-youkai; it was especially easy to do so after Kouga obnoxiously resorted to his standard insults of the hanyou. That and his inappropriate overtures to Kagome really sealed the deal for Inuyasha.

Sesshoumaru stayed out of all the hubbub. He was above such juvenile behavior. Only the girls were worthy of his aid, should he deign to give it and they had no need of it, being fully capable of doctoring Aki on their own. So he just stood by and watched Rin attempt to comfort the Green-eyed center of attention.

Aki puzzled him. She generously accepted Rin's efforts by making the girl feel she had need of such care. No youkai truly needed the child's form of comfort. No normal youkai would accept aid from a stranger graciously. Sesshoumaru couldn't understand it and he was always wary of what he didn't understand.

Kikyou was adjusting the herbal bandages one last time when Kagura reappeared. Before anyone else could react, Aki launched another bolt at the wind-user only to miss once again as Kagura quickly retreated.

Aki sighed tiredly. She glanced over at Kouga, "You still want your stupid re-race?" she asked the wolf prince.

Kagome glared at Kouga significantly and he swallowed uncomfortably. It was apparent that if he were to demand his race right now Kagome would never forgive him. "It can wait," he grumbled before taking off to meet up with his tribe.

Aki erupted in a coughing fit just as he departed. It wasn't pleasant. It wasn't mild. It definitely brought up more poisoned blood. "Ugh!" Aki swallowed, attempting to sooth her throat. She glanced about her and noticed everybody was staring at her. She raised an eyebrow; that was one thing she liked about traveling alone, nobody stared at her like that. The former tutor shook her head. What she wouldn't give for that solitude now! What wouldn't she give for a hot bath too?

A scent blew past her nose. Was that…sulfur? Yes! It was, and water too. Hot Spring! What a stroke of luck! Now, how to get there from here with some amount of privacy insured at the end of the trip? She glanced around the small crowd hovering around her formulating a plan of action.

Aki gave a false sigh, let them think she was truly too tired to run anymore. Slowly she walked over to the little girl dancing at Sesshoumaru's sleeve. The child was filthy and in dire need of a good bath too. Carefully, Aki picked the little thing up, determinedly hiding the pain it caused her lest Kikyou pick up on the damaged state of her hands. Miko powers didn't take kindly to youkai blood after all.

"Hello, what's your name?" she asked the little girl.

"I'm Rin," the girl in her arms smiled toothily.

Aki grinned back. "How would you like to go for a bath?" The girl's eyes widened looking into the miko-demoness's green ones. "There's a hot spring over that way," she motioned in the direction of the scent.

"I don't smell one," Inuyasha said confused.

Aki snorted, "You can't smell me either and I'm right here." Inuyasha glared at her, but her attention had reverted back to the child she was holding. "So how about it Rin?"

Rin's smile grew as she nodded her consent and Aki took off toward the spring before even Kikyou could let out a yell.

"Well," Sango cleared her throat, "at least she left us a direction and a destination." Miroku and Sango sat astride Kirara and set off in the direction Aki had indicated.

The whole processional followed suit with varying degrees of annoyance coloring their features.


	6. Chellenging the Devil

You know, I almost didn't post this before work, but I figured people would revolt if I didn't. That and I suddenly remembered to do it.

This week's schedule didn' seem as bad as last week's on the surface, that is until I came home on Tuesday night to find a missive from my parents asking me to get up and get my brothers off to school. I HAD TO GET UP EARLY ON MY DAY OFF! can you believe that? Sniff sniff.

Worst of all my sinuses started draining screwing up my ears and throat and giving one of those perpetual low grade headaches that just hide in the background to strike out at you when you least desire it... Bah! I hate living where the weather is so unpredictable!

Anyways,I decided to saulve these mild disappointments by typing up a little more of my fic and watching about 15 episodes of an new anime I DLed.

In any case, this particular chapter originally didn't exist, but the original version of the last chapter wound up being so long I cut it in half. So there's more running around type action, or rather more action trying to prevent its continuation.

Rumiko TAkahashi' characters didn't know about all of the stunts I would pull on them when they started working for me. Dog Pile at the end of the chapter! La la la la...

**Challenging the Devil**

It isn't everyday you find yourself leading the craziest bunch of fools to water. Hell, who would want to lead a bunch of fools to water even once? But that, it seems, is a decision left to the powers that be, and the powers that be are a sadistic bunch of bastards wherever and whoever they just so happen to be.

Even so, Aki made it to the hot spring in less than five minutes. Far be it from fate, the universe, and numerous youkai in pursuit to slow her down when there was a hot bath to be had, especially when she had blood and dirt on her clothing and in her hair. And because of her speed in achieving a quick get away to a hot spring, she had won the definite pleasure of a fair number of minutes in the spring alone (excepting the pleasant company of Rin who could use a good scrubbing).

Aki soon had the sulfur-scented area teeming with the burgeoning scent of Lavender and vanilla as she scrubbed her hair and body and clothing with soap. Rin cheerfully received like treatment before sitting down to splash happily in the warm water.

Aki was contentedly soaking in the spring wearing a white sports bra and a pair of cotton shorts. Under normal circumstances she wouldn't have bothered to wear the clothing in the spring, but she was pretty certain she'd be interrupted and the clothing comfortably covered the required skin in her book. She closed her eyes to let the hot water work its magic on her muscles.

Rin was quite happy to play in the water. She seldom got the chance to splash around in the water since she started traveling with her Sesshoumaru-sama, not that she minded really. It was just a rare treat is all. When she was little, her parents would always let her play in the water and they would all laugh. She wrinkled her nose at the funny smells in the air. They were kind of sweet and the kind lady had been nice enough to let her have some, but Rin had never experienced such a potent sweet smell. Usually it was the bad smells that were so strong.

Another thing Rin couldn't understand is why a seemingly responsible adult like this nice lady was would do something as dangerous as falling asleep in the water. Rin's parents had always told her not to do something like that when she was little, so she knew it had to be a bad idea. But Rin didn't want to seem like a bad girl herself by telling her new friend something like that; she had learned early on that people don't like to be told when they're not doing something like they should be.

AS Rin pondered this, Aki's nodding head, which had to this point been far above the water line, began to slip closer to the surface of the spring. The little girl sprang into action; it would be poor manners indeed to allow someone who'd been so kind to her to drown. She pulled at the older female in an attempt to remove her from the water's embrace but Rin was so much smaller than Aki her efforts were barely more than futile at best.

Valiantly, Rin continued to struggle as Aki's savior for a few more moments but in the end she was forced to realize that pint-sized heroes are sometimes heroes when they realize they need a bit more help. And Rin was a well-trained pint-sized hero. When the going got tough, she called for the best reinforcements out there. Taking a deep breath in order to support the proper wail of distress Rin Cried out, "SESSHOUMARU-SAMA!" The effort drew tears from her little fawn-like eyes.

Rin could rule the world with a few shed tears if she ever turned to evil, as it was the delicate treble of the little cherub's voice carrying through the trees was the proper spur to set Kagome, Sango and Kikyou running fast enough to beat even the incomparable Sesshoumaru as they ran to her aid.

Upon being presented with the underdressed teary-eyed little girl, Kagome whipped off Inuyasha's fire rat haori and wrapped it snugly around the child before the dog boy had the opportunity to protest being divested of any part of his wardrobe. Not that the Hanyou failed to give at least a token protest.

Kikyou had failed to care enough about Rin to not run right past her in order to haul Aki clear out of the hot spring and onto the heated rocks that cupped the pool. She was much more concerned with checking on her recently made stitch work than whether a little girl caught cold running around half naked and wet. Some people really need to work on their priorities. Then again, stitches, especially new stitches are supposed to be kept dry.

Sango had been the only one present, who thought to stop the male advance even with the slowly calming Rin. It didn't take a genius to realize that a partially undressed Rin, Aki and a hot spring could possibly mean Aki would be showing a lot more than any of the boys present deserved to ever get a peek at. Thankfully, Sesshoumaru had been content to comfort Rin so Sango didn't have to figure out how to stop him from going closer to Aki. He was beyond her experience and knowledge. Inuyasha and Miroku, she knew how to best stop them.

After efficiently dressing Rin, stopping the boys, and checking Aki's stitches, the girls were faced with a seemingly monumental problem: Dressing Aki. Now, normally it wouldn't be such a horrendously difficult task but Aki had, in her enthusiasm for cleanliness, washed all of her and Rin's clothes and they were currently drying peacefully in the sun. Kikyou didn't normally carry around spares, Sango's clothes surely wouldn't fit and Kagome's had the same problem.

Kagome now lamented her haste in getting the child covered. If she hadn't used Inuyasha's haori on Rin, Aki could've warn it and someone else's clothes could be used to cover the little girl. AS it was, she was pretty sure the hanyou wasn't going to take too kindly to being stripped down even more and she didn't think Sesshoumaru would just over look them taking the red garment off his…um ward (?) and replacing it with another article of clothing. Going back and revamping your work right after you've finished may be wise on tests and homework, but it tends to look bad in social situations.

Despite their predicament, all three women were dead certain they wouldn't be asking Miroku to remove any clothing. And unfortunately, Sango could only stall Inuyasha so long. Miroku she could just knock out, but Inuyasha?

"Oi! What is your problem!" Inuyasha demanded. What dogboy wouldn't have noticed Sango and Kagome consulting Kikyou in a most frenzied way and assume it was a problem?

"Stop right there, Inuyasha!" Kagome ordered sharply. "We need to get Aki a little more dressed first."

"Well why don't you break out some of the stuff in your bag?" he asked slightly confused as to what the problem was. "I'm sure you've got some clothes stuffed in that behemoth bag of yours."

"If I did have something it wouldn't fit her," Kagome retorted, slightly miffed at having her bag slighted by the very jackass who was partly to blame for its size and weight. Where did he think she carried all that ramen? In ramen space? "And Sango's got the same problem with her slayer suit and she's currently wearing her kimono. Not that it would fit Aki either."

"And Kikyou doesn't carry spare clothing," Sango added.

"What do you mean it won't fit? You're the same size!" Inuyasha asked, incredulous of their stupidity.

"WE could pluck some hair off Aki to use for thread," Kikyou mused out loud, "and try to re-sew some of your garments."

"But that would take too long," Kagome pointed out, completely ignoring Inuyasha's obvious inability to understand.

"True," Kikyou sighed. "Besides, it might wake her up and she sleeps so seldom as it is."

"She can't sleep?" Sango asked in surprise.

"More like she won't," Kikyou answered flatly.

"Would you stop ignoring me!" Inuyasha growled.

"Oh fine." Kagome glared at his interruption. "Sango and I, our clothes will not fit Aki. It would be like Sesshoumaru wearing your clothes. Besides looking totally ridiculous, it simply wouldn't work because the clothes won't cover everything we need them to cover."

"Like I would ever let Sesshoumaru wear my clothes!" boy does he ever miss the point. "And Aki isn't that much taller than you!"

"It's not the height that's different," Sango tried to explain.

"Not all girls are…built the same," Kagome waved her hand futilely in the air and shrugged at the inadequacy of the explanation. There was no real way to explain it delicately enough for a fifteen-year-old girl in mixed company.

Sesshoumaru untied Tenseiga and set it aside while Inuyasha continued to stare at Kagome, still failing to see what she was trying to get him to understand.

Shippou blinked at the adults around him and rolled his eyes. If this is what grown ups always acted like, he was going to stay a kid until he died. Couldn't they stop beating around the bush and just get to the specifics? Seriously, it wasn't like the name of a body part or two was going to kill any one.

Rin was totally on the same page as Shippou. She could identify the problem. She could name it even, but she didn't understand why everyone was trying to get away with being so vague. Unlike Shippou, Rin was on the cusp of wanting to be an adult and where Shippou was prepared to just let the grown up mentality drown them all in inanity, Rin felt she should speak up and Rescue the floundering conversation. "Aki's got bigger boobs!" Rin declared and smiled proudly.

As will always happen in mixed company when the subject of some body part or the other is mentioned, everyone (most especially the males of the party) will turn their attention to a study of the indicated anatomy. Thus Inuyasha and Miroku's eyes gravitated towards their inevitable destination to verify the actuality of Rin's statement. Both were then favored with medium sized rocks thrown in the general vicinity of their skulls. Even Kikyou joined in and clocked the perverts once or twice.

Inuyasha cursed and turned his back. "As if I really wanted to see!" he grumbled and was rewarded with another blow to the head.

Miroku wisely remained silent; he'd accumulated his quota of bruises for the day already, no need to exceed it in such a stupid manner.

Kikyou sighed, "AS satisfying as that was, we still haven't solved the problem."

"Argh! Why can't I think of anything?" Kagome half-heartedly kicked a stone with her foot.

"Ladies, I could-" Miroku began.

"No!" Sango and Kagome yelled in unison.

"We wouldn't want your perversion to taint Aki," Sango muttered darkly.

"Not to mention how incorrigible he'd get wearing any less than he is now," Kagome grumbled in response.

"I'm hurt," the delinquent monk touched his hand to his heart. The girls just rolled their eyes; fully immune to his frequent attempts to guilt them into complacency.

Shippou snorted, "You know it's true."

"I give up! You're all against me," the monk mock wailed. "And so Aki will grow ill from neglect because of your refusal of my offered aid."

Even Inuyasha couldn't stand Miroku's attempted guilt trip, "Shut up! They're not going to fall for it, baka!"

"And yet Aki remains in her dampened condition and obviously mostly unclothed," Miroku pointed out. "Illness cannot remain too far away from such conditions."

"Miroku-" Kagome began in annoyance. She blinked as a ball of red and white fabric flew at her out of seemingly nowhere. The time traveler caught it and opened it up to reveal a suspiciously familiar article of clothing. But he would never suffer himself to be anything but impeccably dressed, right?

Kagome and Sango stared at each other for a moment before altering their gaze to see that yes, Sesshoumaru would sacrifice his wardrobe when the need arose. Still, they couldn't believe it. Neither of them had even thought to ask the stoic youkai for aid in this matter. The taiyoukai wasn't known for having a noticeable streak of generosity or chivalry.

Reviving Aki aside, this seemed terribly out of character for him considering his disgust for anything that happened to carry human genetics of any kind, excluding Rin of course. And Sesshoumaru really didn't seem to have a reason to aid Aki beyond returning her life to her.

Kagome and Sango blinked at him; obviously they had missed something.

Kikyou snatched the silky cloth from the miko-in-training impatient to have Aki decently covered.

With the problem of covering Aki out of the way, the group was at odds. The shard hunters couldn't leave because Aki still had some shards and Rin was wearing part of Inuyasha's wardrobe. Sesshoumaru couldn't leave because Aki was wearing a part of his and Kikyou wouldn't leave without the partial youkai former tutor being awake and leaving her behind. So everybody needed to find something to do or risk bloodshed. Or rather, Inuyasha needed to go sulk in a tree and Miroku needed to find a good spot to watch Sango care for her gear where he wouldn't be too easily caught.

The monk decided to pretend to meditate while Kikyou did it for real. Sesshoumaru being Sesshoumaru was perfectly content to stare at everybody while Rin kicked her feet in the water sitting on the edge of the spring.

Kagome pondered opening her Algebra textbook for about half a minute before utterly dismissing the idea. She was too wound up for such serious and heavy thinking homework, or so she told herself. To be perfectly frank, Kagome was simply avoiding her math problems and theories. Procrastination is not a new concept; even before homework was invented people would put things off until the last minute.

So instead of cracking open her schoolbook, she flipped open the top of Aki's deeper than ever bag and what should be sitting on top, but a perfectly ordinary comb. Kagome glanced at the slumbering woman that used to be her tutor then back at the comb. Surely Aki's excessively long wet hair could use some combing. The teenager nodded to herself and grabbed up the comb before spreading Aki's hair out over a towel to keep the dirt and leaves from it.

Aki had the kind of hair that most would love to play with. It was healthy and smooth. It was well cared for and easily manipulated. Kagome could easily imagine that Aki's hair had been coveted by many and loved by at least her mother. Perhaps Aki's mother had brushed her hair like Kagome's had when she was little.

Kikyou sensed the trouble first. The undead miko was already familiar with the partial youkai's trouble sleeping. Fred had divulged all in his attempts to convince Kikyou to be a little sinful. Even if he hadn't, it was difficult to miss the way Aki never slept until she collapsed and then she didn't stay asleep long enough to do more than minutest amount of good. So she had been watching for the foreigner to start the expected tossing and turning. Something would set it off, or nothing would, but always Aki woke herself up.

Kikyou was hoping that if she stopped the stimulant then maybe Aki would sleep longer. She certainly could use the rest!

"Stop that!" the miko ordered sharply.

Kagome blinked up at her pre-incarnation. "What?" What could Kikyou possibly object to about her combing Aki's hair?

Kikyou stared at Kagome, "Just stop combing her hair." She ordered gently.

"Why?" Kagome asked in confusion.

Kikyou shook her head. "Don't touch her and she might sleep a little longer."

Kagome stared at the glorified clay pot like she was crazy. "What on earth is your problem? I'm not hurting anything. Why can't you just leave me alone?"

Kikyou sighed, a very painful action for a dead woman. Aki's restless behavior had not calmed when Kagome ceased pulling the comb through her hair. "Aki never sleeps for long and it appears it is too late to keep her from waking."

And Aki sat up abruptly and hugged her knees to her chest. The smooth motion was more than her abused body should have been forced to make and it tore a few stitches loose. Her panicked breathing puffed at her hair when it settled around her face. She was aware that there was a crowd of people around her, but she didn't care at the moment. All that mattered was getting the images inside her head back where they belonged.

She was fighting her own brain, refusing to finish the events of her nightmare while she was awake. Bad memories have a way of being stubbornly at the forefront of your mind, and when you do manage to push them away they sneak back to the center of your attention while you are asleep. Aki was convinced she needed to sleep less, as if that would make things better.

As Aki slowly dragged her mind out from under the influence of her nightmare, she dragged her hair back to tuck it behind her ear absently. One stray lock decided it couldn't be bothered to stay where it was put; it rather liked being in her face. Aki blew at it distractedly only to have the stubborn hair settle back where it was. She growled at it in annoyance before trying one more time to tuck it behind her ear.

A small sound tickled her ear and her eyes narrowed in on the source. It would seem that the great Ice Prince was having trouble stifling his laughter. Aki blinked mildly mollified, at least her behavior was so absurd as to crack the indifferent façade of Sesshoumaru, though no one else seemed to want to laugh. Then again, most of them probably hadn't heard her rather quiet growl over Kagome and Kikyou's continued argument.

She glanced away from the youkai attempting not to laugh at her and realized she was wearing an article of clothing that didn't belong to her. No wonder he'd found her amusing, such silly behavior while dressed in clothing that almost swallowed her whole would crack anybody up, Aki admitted.

"Just what the hell am I wearing?" Aki murmured in slight confusion.

"I'm sorry, did you say something?" Kikyou cut off her argument with Kagome. Kagome looked ready to spit nails but likewise suspended the argument.

"Nothing of import," Aki decided more loudly as she pushed to her feet. She swayed slightly, sending her unbound hair free of the minor restriction of her ears.

"Here let me tie your hair back for you," Kikyou demanded, pushing Aki back into a sitting position. Aki's growl of defiance was drowned out by Kagome's outburst, but neither stalled Kikyou's skilled hands from dressing Aki's hair.

Rin decided that her hair needed tending to as well and seated herself in front of Aki. Aki chuckled, regretted it, and set about finger combing Rin's terribly snarled hair. The little girl obviously didn't get her hair combed very often and ran wild as children do. Aki sighed and proceeded to braid Rin's hair before the child could grow bored of sitting still.

Aki smiled slightly and coughed before taking in a deep breath. Careful not to give away what she could sense she stood and faced the direction of the on-coming threat. A quick glance at the sun had her silently groaning. She didn't have time for this, not if she wanted to get away from the group tonight.

She'd been meaning to pick this fight, but she really hadn't wanted to risk tipping her hand just yet. Well she'd decided to do it; she'd just have to accept that the situation wasn't as ideal as she could wish.

Naraku stepped out into the space on the other side of the hot spring. His smirking countenance glared across the water with gleeful menace. Kagura stood behind him, quite obviously not happy to be there. Despite the decided chill brought by his presence, Inuyasha was too busy sulking to notice the arrival of his most hated enemy.

Naraku looked startled when he found Aki facing him with expectation. Her unwavering glare on him was unnerving as hell. The evil bastard recovered quickly enough.

"What an unpleasant surprise," Aki said coolly. "Did you get that tired of waiting for me to turn your trap against you?" she asked, sweet as icing.

"Oh," He intoned darkly. Naraku shouldn't have been all that surprised that Aki had figured out at least part of the plan, but it didn't matter. The plot to trap her hadn't managed to get off the ground, thanks to Kagura's bungling. "What interesting company you keep?" and he meant it. His information insisted she was solitary, traveling only with a ghost.

Aki snorted, "I can't help who insists on following me. Take yourself for example," and her glare said what she thought of him showing up. "I challenge you, you set the rules."

"Anything goes," Naraku replied smugly. He was familiar with her style of shard collection. "Stakes?"

"Half the Shikon no kakera in your possession," she stated.

"And what do I win?" he asked, ready to manipulate her into coughing up what he wanted.

She smiled wickedly; she already knew what he wanted, "Me." Naraku was always looking to absorb strong youkai and she'd proved herself to be of interest to him, and she knew it. Naraku had already tried to claim her strength. "Weapons? Form?"

The group was thoroughly flabbergasted. What did Aki think she was doing? After all, what sort of idiot wagers those kind of stakes in a fight with Naraku?

"Whatever comes to hand, and whatever form works," he replied to her questions still stunned that he hadn't had to haggle for the stakes he wanted. "What ends the contest? How will the game be ended?"

"The game ends one of three ways," she replied smoothly. "I win by finding evidence of feeling in you. You win by discovering my true name. Or…" she paused dramatically raising the short hairs on everyone who listened. "One of us dies," she finished with finality.

Naraku smiled evilly, he was certain of victory. He knew he had no feelings, and if he did, he could disguise it easily. It was just a matter of time before he found out her name. He began to chuckle evilly, already plotting ways to put her powers to use against his enemies and towards gathering the rest of the Shikon. Naraku had obviously never heard the old adage "never count your chickens before they hatch."

Aki slid into a defensive stance prepared for the first attack from the devious bastard. Her fingers flexed with painful anticipation.

Kagura whispered something in Naraku's ear and he smirked. "You're name is Aki," he declared smugly.

Aki grinned, "Nope, try again." Naraku's eyes widened with confusion. "That _is_ what people call me, but it was not always so. My mother graced me with a different name and that is the name you must find." She shifted again, preparing to attack instead of waiting for him.

Naraku blinked, this little challenge may be a bit harder than he had supposed it would be. He would need to come up with a proper plan to win his prize. Luckily an excuse presented itself in the shape of a hell insect. "WE will meet again," Naraku declared evilly before following the insect as if it had given him news of some importance instead of telling him that his buddies had found this great wasp bar.

Aki couldn't believe it. The bastard was leaving before they even exchanged blows. This wasn't happening. In fact she wasn't going to let it happen, and she launched herself after the fleeing incarnation of evil.

Kagome looked desperately around for something to stop the woman in time. She looked at Inuyasha sulking in a tree. That might do it. Kagome let out a yell, "Osuwari!"

Inuyasha fell off his tree branch and went crashing down and down and down onto Aki as she was just passing beneath him.

"Hey get off!" Aki screamed as Inuyasha got a face full of…something. He was sure he'd get more than a stone to the head if he wasn't careful this time.

Kagome now had three demons cursing at her. One that just fell out of a tree, one that got landed on and one trying to peel his brother off the under clad female youkai on the bottom.


	7. Youkai in Lust

And Back again. You were waiting for this, you know you were.

I would like to point out that while Sesshoumaru has met Aki before, she looked very very _very_ freakin' different. And though he has seen her since (at a very great distance) he hasn't made the connection between the "hallucination" that helped him after he lost his arm and Aki. He won't make the connection until it is forced down his handsome throat because Sesshoumaru, like most males, doesn't see what's right under his marvelously powerful nose. But the realization and connection are for later when it will be most effective in driving him mildly crazy. I'm so evil!

I would also like to remind everybody about the second part of the Urasei's spell alteration. You may remember that Aki was to go into a false heat the next time a male youkai touched her. WEll, Sesshoumaru stuck her with his claws, that would count as being touched wouldn't it? Hee, hee. Bet you thought I'd forgotten about it. WEll you were wrong! I just love to save plot devices for the most inoppurtune moments. And I love to set them up way in advance just to keep my readers in suspense. It makes you think and exercise that wonderful underdeveloped memory you have. I am after all, a firm believer in making people think.

Oh and despite the title, there is no intimate encounter to speak of in this chapter. In fact, there will be no lemons whatsoever in this fic at all. poor you. You were so looking forward to it.

The question is, which youkai is feeling the lust, and when the hell will it be acted upon. If it ever is...

I am sooo evil!

The Inuyasha cast have now demanded that I pay for them to undergo therapy as a result to the stress they are subjected to by working for me. Fred says they're a bunch of wimps and that they should be glad they aren't my characters to begin with!

**Youkai in…Lust?**

Kagome wasn't one to insist on being the center of attention. Sometimes it was best to stand on the fringes of the spotlight and smile smugly at the poor bastard who got suckered into suffering all the scrutiny. Unfortunately, the poor girl found herself stuck smack dab in the middle of a rather red tinged spotlight in front of a group of people, not the least of which were three very unhappy youkai.

"Kagome, that hurt," Aki hollered.

"What'd you do that for, wench?" Inuyasha bellowed.

"I was ashamed before to admit that you were a blood relative, but now," Sesshoumaru growled as he continued to attempt to unearth Aki by ripping Inuyasha up by his hair. "There are not words to describe the disgrace you present yourself to be."

It was hard to tell what bothered the inu youkai more, that Inuyasha was plastered to the ground with Aki underneath him or that the hanyou had wound up that way because a little human wench had told him to sit like a dog.

And poor Kagome was put on the spot to explain her actions. In the end she didn't have to. As soon as Sesshoumaru had managed to peel Inuyasha off the slightly flattened Aki, the former English tutor sprang up to pursue Naraku. Both brothers pounced on her before either even realized what they were doing. Seriously, who wanted to run through the forest some more?

"He's getting away!" Aki screamed as she struggled to break free. "Get off of me! This is really no time for a dog pile!" Inuyasha growled at that, but his insulted sensibilities didn't make him let go.

Everybody was stunned, well except for Kikyou. Did Aki have a death wish? She was in terrible shape, what with being wounded and still suffering from the toxicity of Sesshoumaru's claws. She was in no condition to be fighting the most cunning and evil enemy they'd ever encountered.

"You're doing it again," a voice said, making nearly everyone jump.

"Please don't tell me you're here to save me again," Aki said from under two inu youkai. "Last time you tried that you nearly got everybody in the area killed." She groaned at the memory.

"Hey, it wasn't the last time, it was the time before that!" Fred corrected her pointlessly.

"Right Fred, last time you only nearly killed a measly half," she responded dryly while trying to find a way out of being on the bottom of a dog pile.

"Whatever," the ghost shrugged. "Sometimes you are so tiresome. Anyway, I'm not here to save you. I don't have to bother, Kikyou's going to ensure you live through this bought of stupidity you're going through."

Most of the group looked at the undead miko to see what the see-through guy was talking about. Kikyou held a packet of herbs in one hand, which she was carefully measuring out.

Sesshoumaru felt the squirming female under their pile go very still. Obviously she knew what the ghost was talking about better than the rest of them. She then launched an escape plan with renewed force and energy.

"How much are you giving her?" Kagome inquired noticing the immense size of the dose Kikyou was measuring out.

"Five times the normal dose," Kikyou responded absently. "Last time I gave her only two times the normal amount, which would've knocked any normal person off their feet and into a deep sleep for several days. She was up in an hour." Kikyou kept her concentration on the growing dose in her hand. "The only way we're going to get her to stay put is to make her sleep. And with those wounds, the longer she sleeps the better."

"No!" Aki objected vociferously. "Kikyou don't do this!"

Kikyou kept pouring; desperately trying not to think of what Aki's nightmares could possibly be considering the things the miko had seen her stare down without a change of expression.

"Let go of me!" Aki's maneuvering took on a desperate strength that rocked the two males holding her down.

Sesshoumaru was quite impressed. AS damaged as the female was, she was still making it difficult for himself and Inuyasha to hold her down. Quite a feat considering how strong the youkai lord considered himself to be.

Kikyou finished her measurements. "Sorry," she apologized in advance, "I'd dilute it like we're supposed to, but you're not likely to stay put that long." The miko turned to Miroku, "Monk. Will you help me get it down her?" she asked.

The two brothers levered the protesting Aki into an upright position and Kikyou, with Miroku's help, forced the bitter powder down her throat.

"This is for your own good!" Kikyou stated firmly.

Aki gagged as the last bit of it left a powdery trail down the back of her throat. "Ugh!" she made a face. The stuff threatened to come right back up again, but the look on Kikyou's face made her swallow it.

Kagome handed Aki a cup of water from the spring and Inuyasha cheerfully forced that down her throat. "I hate you," she glowered at everyone present. Her mood was especially foul as the warm water settled in her poor abused stomach. "You'll get yours," she muttered darkly. "It may not be me that sees that it happens, but it will."

Miroku chuckled, "You're prophesy can't help but come true. WE all have quite a bit left to live yet and it's pretty certain we'll have a lot of bad days. I swear at least one of them will be dedicated to you."

Aki reacted rather violently to that, or rather she would have if Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha weren't still holding her down. "It would never be enough! One bad day would never equal the hell of what you've all sentenced me to!"

"They're just nightmares Aki, don't be overly dramatic," Inuyasha pinched her arm. "I can't see why you're making such a big deal over nothing."

Aki's glare turned on him with such force he stepped back in fright. "Oh they're real alright," she declared intensely dark. The weight of her words throbbed in the space he'd placed between them. "All the best nightmares are. After all, what is more frightening than an irrefutable truth you'd rather forget."

"What truth?" Shippou the ever inquisitive asked despite the creeping sensation crawling down his arms.

Aki's luminous green eyes swung to stare into him, "My truth. A truth that the real monsters can't even compare to. Truth so terrible and real that life has no hope to ever compare." She bit her lip and realized she'd said more than she'd ever meant to. "A truth I will never share."

"But Aki," Kagome tried to persuade her to tell them about it. "It helps to talk about it, to share it."

Aki snorted, "The whole world knew my truth and instead of it helping, it hurt more. The world blamed me for my truth until their blame caused more damage to me and added to my truth. I'll not share it, thanks."

"That's not healthy," Kagome declared.

"But it won't kill me," Aki brushed her efforts aside. "I think splitting up would be a very good idea," she changed the subject. Her eyes were beginning to look a little glazed. "We have here a lot of targets and each of them likely to draw a lot of attention. Attention you've all seen to it that I can't handle right now."

Kagome sighed and let it go. Besides, Aki had a point about splitting up. "She's right, if we all stay here we would be inviting trouble. Naraku knows where we are and we can't move as such a large group without him being sure to know where we would go. Plus we have all these Shikon shards so every youkai in the area will be coming after them. Kikyou, I'm sorry, but you invite quite a bit of trouble just by being you. Villagers don't like you, youkai don't like you, and you can't offer Aki any protection or even a sanctuary of any kind." The miko had to agree; it was certainly true. "Fred, You certainly can't protect Aki and you can't help her either."

"Nonsense! I've helped Aki before," the ghost declared and Aki burst out laughing. "Well I have."

"That wasn't the kind of help she meant," Aki chuckled derisively.

"Sesshoumaru's bound to have enemies what with being a lord and all that. Plus Naraku's bound to bother him again sometime," Kagome observed. "We're all problem magnets no matter how you look at it."

"So what do you propose?" Sesshoumaru inquired as he absently caught Aki before she fell. It appeared the herbs were throwing off her balance.

"I suggest we split up into our original traveling groups," Kagome held up her hand to stave off a wave of objections. "I'm not finished! I also suggest we pick one of those groups to stay and protect Aki while she's asle-No Fred you aren't going to do it!" the ghost harrumphed and glowered at the ninth grader.

"I could stay," Kikyou began and was immediately met with protests on all sides.

"Like you could protect her from anything!" Fred snorted.

"Then it's almost certain Naraku will come!" Kagome objected.

"You can't do it, you just can't!" Inuyasha growled. Couldn't he come up with something a little more concrete?

"Don't you have some other places you have to go or something?" Miroku asked.

"I want to stay, I could protect her!" Shippou shouted over all of them. Everybody laughed good-naturedly to Shippou's chagrin. "Well, I could…"

"I doubt very much that the sleeping one would be happy to see your face when she wakes up," Sesshoumaru observed blandly.

"I suppose you're right," Kikyou agreed with little grace.

"Us staying as a group is out," Sango said. "This large a group is bound to draw something, and we have the Shikon no Kakera with us. We'll be sending up a red flag to anybody in the era that's interested in them. And that's without considering Naraku and his detachments never leave us alone for long."

Inuyasha opened his mouth as if to offer a suggestion when Kagome cut him off. "We're more likely to be trouble than to defend against it. Sango and I could stay." Inuyasha was definitely against that, but Miroku beat him to it.

"I must disagree with that suggestion," Miroku began and Inuyasha growled at him. "Miss Kagome, you would still have the shards, which would still draw in all the problems the rest of the group would if we stayed together."

"Oh yeah! You're right," Kagome thought for a minute. "Then you and Inuyasha could stay, or just Inuyasha. I'd never trust you here alone with Aki sleeping."

Inuyasha steamrolled over Miroku's attempts to protest his innocence and so-called virtue. "The hell if I'm staying here! We have to find the shards and you know you can't collect them without me around to beat up the morons that have them!"

"I'm insulted," Sango glared at the hanyou. "My family has been killing youkai for generations without your help."

"Yeah, and Miroku has taken down several youkai all on his own," Kagome pointed out.

"Yeah, but you guys are too likely to forget to actually look for shards," Inuyasha declared.

"I'd shut up if I were you, Inuyasha," Aki mumbled. "You're just making them angrier." In truth, she didn't really mind their stupid arguing. They were making enough noise that she didn't have to worry about being able to sleep through it.

"Sesshoumaru-sama, could we stay?" Rin asked her protector.

Everyone was surprised, except Sesshoumaru who had been expecting it. Rin seemed to like the partial youkai and it was quite obvious nobody else could look after her while she was going to be unconscious. They'd already identified all the problems associated with every other possibility, it was only a matter of time before they figured out they had to leave Aki with him. And Sesshoumaru found he didn't mind looking after the strange female either.

"It would be dangerous for Rin to be kept around me while I'm unable to help defend her," Aki declared. "Besides, it's more difficult to watch two targets than just one."

"I don't care!" Rin cried and began to wail.

"Stop Rin," Sesshoumaru said quietly and the girl halted her tears abruptly.

The child smiled brightly, obviously having realized a solution to Aki's objection. "I don't have to stay," she pouted not really wanting to go away, "but Sesshoumaru-sama still can! He'd be the bestest protector ever!" Rin beamed at them all.

"That might work," Kikyou began. "No wait let me finish." She looked sharply at Inuyasha who'd been about to interrupt. "You have someone who can look after the child, don't you?" she directed the question at Sesshoumaru.

He nodded minutely, "I'd have to take her there."

"Alright then, since we can't all stay and Sesshoumaru, sans Rin, seems to be the least troublesome protector, I elect that Sesshoumaru watch over Aki after dropping off Rin. I also suggest that I stay until he comes back," Kikyou said.

"I suggest we move her first," Sango interjected. "Naraku and Kagura know this place and that we were here," she pointed out. "I'm not saying we have to move her very far, just far enough away so that they can't find her immediately."

Kagome nodded as Kikyou moved to collect the still damp clothes to be taken with their respective owners. Kagome rummaged in her bag for an extra shirt Rin could borrow so Inuyasha could have his Haori back.

Kikyou packed Aki's things back into her bag and made a bundle out of Rin's clothes. After Aki was maneuvered into her shoulder bag and Rin's bundle was tied firmly on the child's back, the group divided in two. Kikyou and Sesshoumaru were moving Aki somewhere a bit safer and Inuyasha's group was going back to their quest.

"You know Kikyou," Aki began drowsily, "you don't really need to stay. Kouga is to the south heading west about 20km from here. Naraku and Kagura are to the East going further that way about 40 km away. There's nothing but insects, birds, and ten or twelve dear anywhere near here."

"You can smell them from here?" the youkai asked. She nodded and realized he couldn't see it with her on his back, so she answered in the affirmative out loud.

"That doesn't mean there couldn't be trouble anyway," Kikyou replied stubbornly. "Either way, I'm staying with you whether you like it or not."

Sesshoumaru felt more than heard the woman sigh. He knew better than to interrupt their discussion, but he found himself aching at the weariness he could hear in Aki's words.

"Do what you want, you will anyway," the partial youkai said peevishly. She was only talking now because it helped fight off the dark edge of sleep that kept creeping up on her. Aki didn't want what that intangible curtain brought with it and the longer she fought the drug, the less time she'd be out. She hoped anyway.

They finally stopped, just as the rhythmic motion of walking was beginning to put her to sleep. Sesshoumaru gathered up Rin and took off in the direction where he'd last left Jaken.

"Kikyou?" Aki began.

"Hmm?" Kikyou hummed. "I thought you'd be asleep by now. Heck, I thought you were asleep."

Aki ignored the comment and continued. "I think some of my stitches came loose." Kikyou moved to look and noticed for the first time the damaged state of her hands.

"What's this?" Kikyou demanded seizing the blistered flesh and Aki winced. "Why didn't you show us this before?" she demanded as she began to doctor the raw skin roughly.

Aki bit her lip and refused to show Kikyou just how much pain the undead miko was inducing. "Kyaa! Kikyou! At least leave me my claws!" when the miko showed no notice she continued. "If you want me to wear the bandages, you'd better leave the claws out. Wrap the palms fine but leave the fingers unrestrained!"

"You won't need…" Kikyou paused; suddenly rethinking the situation she was leaving Aki in.

"What is it?" Aki asked, observing the change in Kikyou's behavior.

"I can't believe I'm leaving you alone with him…" Kikyou readjusted the bandages making absolutely certain the material didn't impede her clawed fingers.

"Thanks Kikyou, but what made you change your mind?" Aki wondered in the haze induced by the herbs forced on her.

"Well, Sesshoumaru's a male," the miko began.

"You noticed that, did you," Aki broke in dryly, narrowing her eyes. An inkling of just were this might be going almost broke through the fuzzy veil covering her thoughts.

"You're a girl," the miko continued.

"Last time I checked that was correct," Aki responded.

"Well, doesn't that worry you?" Kikyou cried. "He might take advantage of your indefensible condition," she finished in a rush.

Aki grinned, her eyes shiny with mirth. "You're worried about that? He won't touch me at all. I've got too much human blood in my veins to interest Mr. High-and-Mighty-Fluffy-Thing!"

"Even so, you're an attractive female and will be alone in his care. He may surprise you," Kikyou insisted.

"What? And ravish me in my sleep?" She exclaimed in disbelief.

"You would never know either way," Kikyou's defense was getting weaker.

"The hell I wouldn't. I'd be able to smell him on me. As I said before, I've got too much human in my blood. Naraku's the only one I've met likely to take me by force, and he'd make damn sure I was awake to suffer through the experience," Aki finished firmly. "Besides there's nothing you can do to change the plans now. You're leaving, so stop worrying about it."

Kikyou looked at her as if to say something else in support of her fear. Aki stilled the words by raising her hand tiredly. "I said enough."

Kikyou closed her mouth and busied herself by rechecking the youkai's injuries. "The poison is still in your blood," she observed.

"So it is," Aki agreed.

The miko looked at the former English tutor's face, "Why hasn't it been cleaned out yet?"

"A number of reasons, not the least of which is my really worthless healing ability," Aki sighed. A cough tickled the back of her throat and she suppressed it not wanting to taste her own poisoned blood again. "The blood loss helped get rid of some of the poison." It also got rid of a lot of important good stuff with it.

"Here," Kikyou shoved something at her and Aki blinked. It was a container of water. "You need it, especially after you lost all that blood. You should eat something too, but I'll let Sesshoumaru see to that. I doubt I'd be able to make you eat before I leave." Aki gave the miko a devilish grin and Kikyou just glared at her.

Action was helping keep her awake. Keeping up the fight against sleep without getting caught that was getting difficult. She was running out of ways to distract her self-appointed guardian miko. That was kind of humorous, a youkai being protected by a miko.

The medication was beginning to make everything seem kind of funny. This couldn't be good.

Luckily, Sesshoumaru arrived right about the time she nearly succumbed to the drug. That is, his arrival helped her wake back up, much to Kikyou's disappointment. She'd hoped Aki would've been asleep by now.

"You're shifts done now Kikyou," Aki sang, consciously rubbing in the fact she hadn't passed out yet.

Kikyou glared at her before turning to give Sesshoumaru her last instructions about how to care for Aki in the miko's absence. Then she turned and left without saying good-bye. Dead people can be so rude.

Aki sighed and stood up to stretch up to the sky. Subsequently she showed off the length and shape of her body without really noticing or caring.

Sesshoumaru watched her muscles ripple under her exposed skin seemingly entranced. A beam of the fading light splashed onto her hair and the area was lit with the golden brilliance.

Absently, she let her body recoil from the stretch with a yawn. Aki was slightly afraid to move around too much. It might cause her injury or something since she couldn't seem to tell where her center of gravity was from one moment to the next.

Sesshoumaru shook his head to dislodge the sensory images watching her created. He clenched his hands until his claws dug into the flesh of his palm. It was truly strange to feel this insane sweep of distrust of his own body. He'd never felt this way so strongly about anyone. Nor was he given to react quite so easily to such an innocent gesture.

He blinked and watched as Aki began to doze. That wench, Kikyou had said that this woman was likely to wake herself up before it was healthy for her to do so. She'd given him another dose of the sleeping powder just before she left.

Sesshoumaru found himself intrigued by the little female fighting the effects of the herbs that had been shoved down her throat. What could possibly be so terrible as to frighten anyone as strong as she'd proven to be? He wanted to know. He was curious, and he couldn't figure out why. Anyone else, anything else and he wouldn't care. He was the lord of the Western Lands, what did he care about some random lesser demon. But he wanted to know about Aki.

"So," Aki began stifling a yawn, "You took Rin back to that guy who was supposed to be watching her in the first place. Are you sure she's going to be alright?" She gave him a sketchy smirk, "I mean, he didn't do such a good job the last time."

"She shall be fine. Jaken is very clear as to what will transpire should he fail again," Sesshoumaru answered evenly. "Rin promised not to wander off again."

Aki almost laughed. "Rin may be an adorable angel, but…well lets just say things happen and small children tend to have selective memory." She smiled in a confiding manner, "Some adults do too."

Sesshoumaru stared at her, somehow getting the impression she was referring to him but certain she couldn't be. It was a valid statement in the general sense and he couldn't truly refute it when darkness hovered in her eyes that bespoke experience with the subject. In any case, the conversation was pointless and he recognized it for what it was, a diversionary tactic. Aki was fighting to stay awake and engaging in conversation aided in achieving that goal while distracting the person she conversed with. Too bad he wasn't likely to ever fall for it. The inu youkai never was big on conversation.

"I am here to keep watch over you and I will not be talked into leaving so you can stop trying," he declared firmly.

Aki blinked up at him. Should she tell him _now_ that it was about to rain? Nah. She liked the rain. Of course Sesshoumaru wasn't about to let her play in the rain if he had prior knowledge of it.

"What are you smirking about now?" his eyes narrowed down at her.

Aki grinned, "I know something you don't know!" She stood up just as the first drops of rain began to fall. "Hmm, that's a little off," she stared up at the sky in puzzlement. Normally she was a little better at judging the weather.

Suddenly her feet were no longer touching the ground and silver hair tickled her nose. "What the hell?" her arms convulsively clung to the nearest object. The nearest object happened to be Sesshoumaru's shoulders. She found herself receiving yet another piggyback ride. "Where are you going now?" she asked sleepily.

"Someplace dry. Did you know it was going to rain?" Sesshoumaru's accusation was filled with palpable suspicion.

"What? I can't even walk straight and you want me to predict the weather! I don't know what you've been told, but I'm not super woman!" Aki declared with a snort.

"So you did know," the dog demon stated with conviction.

Aki pouted quietly from her perch. "There was a cave back that way," she pointed over his shoulder, "we passed it on the way here."

Sesshoumaru headed in the direction indicated by her gesture and marveled at her ability for observation in her condition. Even more impressive that she noticed the cave when he, in perfect health and completely alert, had missed it.

They were barely half way there when the sun set completely. Aki hissed in pain as the moment struck her like she knew it would. Her control over her illusions and physical appearance wasn't perfect and most likely never would be, but the greatest trial was when the sun sank under the horizon. It seemed the sun affected her youkai blood and when the sun sank it surged against her control. Normally she could control the effects, but she was in no condition to handle it today.

Sesshoumaru paused when the shape of his burden appeared to change. Just what was she up to now? He glanced down at her hands where they rested against his chest. Suddenly Aki's hands appeared more talon-like than they had been. One of her fists was clenched tightly, causing blood to drip down the front of his clothes.

Honestly, he didn't care about the stain; it was the smell that bothered him. On most occasions he liked the smell of blood, but Aki's blood smelled wrong for more reason than the taint of his own toxins laced through it.

Whatever Aki was up to, she needed to get out of the rain regardless. Sesshoumaru increased his speed and nearly missed the cave in the darkening light. His new ward had to nip him with her claws to get his attention.

The inu youkai rushed inside the relatively dry interior of the cave and set his cargo down as gently as possible. Then he went to investigate the rest of the cave. He wasn't as wet as he could've been, the body he'd carried made quite an effective umbrella. His pants were wet around his semi-ruined shoes, which he kicked off before turning to check over his charge.

Sesshoumaru's phenomenal control failed as he gasped at the changes in Aki. Where once a woman of average height had stood now a youkai nearly as tall as him attempted to wring the water out of her hair. Hair that had formally been the color of golden honey was now a shiny almond. Her ears had migrated to the top of her head. But those were the more subtle changes. After all, the sudden appearance of transparent feathered wings and an iridescent scaled tail were quite the opposite of subtle. It was certainly a unique combination, he had to admit.

Aki was completely unaware of his intense scrutiny. She was more concerned with other more pressing matters like being soaking wet. Originally she'd been pretty dry down her front, but all that hair tends to retain a lot of water and without a towel there was no hope of it remaining dry. Being wet certainly didn't help her aching muscles. Ever since the first time she'd changed, assuming her more youkai form had always been painful. Hence why she tried to avoid it.

Today, however, the pain had helped her fight back the meds that were attempting to knock her out. She never thought she'd be happy about not being who she used to be.

"What happened?" Sesshoumaru asked.

Aki took a moment to answer while she fought back a cough. "The sun went down," she enunciated very carefully around her elongated fangs. "Usually I prevent the change, but I don't have the concentration or the strength tonight."

"Why would you prefer to look less youkai?" Sesshoumaru couldn't understand someone not wanting to look powerful, and she certainly looked powerful.

"Well, for starters the wings get in the way," Aki began. "And the tail and ears leave me open for attack simply because I'm not human. Without them I draw less attention."

"I don't think it's the attention you're really worried about," a new voice broke in.

Sesshoumaru moved between Aki and the voice prepared to defend her as he was meant to but there was really no reason for him to have bothered. It was only Fred.

Aki just sighed as her guardian toned down his guard. "Mostly, it's because I don't recognize myself after I've changed." The doped up, suffering, changed female shook her head and put forth the effort to return her appearance to what it normally was nowadays. Evidently the effort was a bit more than she could afford to expend and her knees gave way under her.

Sesshoumaru barely caught her before her head smacked the dirt. He was horrified by the heated texture her temperature had given to her skin. She was soaked to the bone, she should feel cold and clammy, but she was burning. "Why did you not say you had a fever?"

"I didn't realize I had one," Aki mumbled, wondering how long it would take for the Urasei's punishment to finish her off.

Sesshoumaru growled with displeasure before setting her down to scout out the rest of the cave in case he had missed something.

Aki watched the other youkai search the cave for a moment before dismissing his activity for more active employment. She started to spread out her damp clothes so that they could dry a little more. Eventually she hoped to be dressed in something that didn't drip water into the dirt at her feet. Distractedly she reminded Fred that he wasn't supposed to be bugging them anymore.

Fred replied with his usual teasing. "You don't really want me to leave you _alone_ with Sesshoumaru now, do you?" His mock horror was layered on real thick.

Aki gave Fred a sharp look while the lord wasn't looking. There was no need for Sesshoumaru to know what the real problem was. "You know that's not it, Fred," she responded and threw a book through his semi-transparent head.

Sesshoumaru's search at the back of the cave had met with a small measure of success. There was a small crevice filled with cool, clean water that Aki could drink. He figured that if water could help after blood loss, cool water could help bring down a fever. At the very least it could help replace what she lost.

Luckily he did carry a small water pouch for travel and when he reached to retrieve it, his hand brushed against the package he had nearly forgotten about. Sesshoumaru pulled out the cloth bundle and looked back towards where he'd left his patient, only to find her not resting and otherwise sitting still like she should have been.

The inu youkai stalked to the front of the cave and seized Aki's wrist rather abruptly.

"Hey!" Aki objected to being manhandled.

"The ill should not be doing laundry," he growled shortly and thumped her in the chest with the package.

"The ill shouldn't be handled too roughly," Aki pointed out before bothering to inspect what he'd given her. "Now what is this?"

Sesshoumaru turned to stare out the mouth of the cave. "The ill should be properly dressed in dry clothing."

"I guess I can agree with that," Aki murmured as the silk fell to drape towards the floor. "I'll warn you now, I haven't a clue as to how to wear a kimono properly."

Sesshoumaru didn't bother to respond to that as he was too caught up in the sound of cloth sliding over skin. The murmurs of her sensual pleasure of the feel of silk against her skin nearly put the killing blow on his control. All the while he was trying not to remember that gifts of silk and clothing were normally reserved for during courting and mating.

"I think I'm presentable. What do you think Fred?" she called out to let him know she was decent.

"Not bad," the ghost offered in critique. "You look like you're ready for a bath."

"Your just jealous that you can't change clothes," Aki scoffed.

"Well how would you feel if for the rest of time you looked like you were dressed by your mother?" Fred grumbled. "You know I would never pick these clothes out for myself. I think she had to run out and buy them because I wouldn't have kept them in my closet."

"You're mother's taste wasn't that bad," Aki argued.

"I didn't say it was bad," he countered. "I just said it wasn't mine."

Sesshoumaru observed them as they continued to argue. They were like siblings, or old lovers. A bitter feeling settled into his stomach and the lord dismissed it as something he ate. That reminded him. "Kikyou told me to make sure you ate," he interrupted their play fight.

Aki blanched and fought back a yawn. It was a toss up on what bothered her more, the thought of eating or the thought of sleeping.

"At the moment I'm willing to forego the forced meal," Sesshoumaru continued. "Instead, you will sleep." He shoved her to the floor and growled when she tried to get back up. "Sleep!"

Aki grumbled under her breath about over bearing youkai and evil mikos. Despite her disgruntlement, she quickly fell unconscious.

Fred hovered over Aki and stared at her face. Twenty minutes after his friend sank into somnolence the disturbance started. He could always tell when the nightmares began. "And so the horror begins," he mumbled.

Sesshoumaru studied the ghost before glancing down at his charge. "Does she always suffer such nightmares?" he asked the ghost.

Fred blinked up at him. "Always. They may change a little from nightmare to nightmare, but the content is always the same."

"What does she dream?" the youkai demanded.

"She relives the night she found her family, dead." Ghosts couldn't shiver, but Fred did a good imitation. "Do you know how terrifying it is to come home on some random evening and find everything you loved was covered in blood that flowed against the tilt of the floor and wouldn't soak into the carpet? To find the bodies of your kin laying in pools of their own blood without a mark on them and then see that the blood flowed from their bodies to congregate in the hall and then flow towards the front door against all reason? I can't even imagine it." He looked like he would throw up if he were alive. "And she, wonderful, caring, and funny Aki lived through that in house after house after house in one night."

And that was the nightmare that plagued her? Sesshoumaru's eyes landed on her face as the tears began to streak down it. He knew full-blooded warriors that would've been driven insane from suffering such nightmares over and over again.

"She never cries when she's awake," Fred commented quietly. "She's afraid to care about anyone else because of this curse she believes caused it all. She'll never heal that way."

Sesshoumaru stared at Fred, not quite certain of his sanity. Then again, the human was dead, what was the point of sanity? He shook his head before crouching down next to the sleeping female. Since he'd taken in Rin, he'd grown rather skilled at soothing nightmares. He could at least put those skills to use for the woman he was to guard. "Shh," he whispered in her ear while petting her hair. "It's okay."

Aki's face slowly eased of tension as he continued his attempts to comfort her. Eventually her body relaxed a little more and she wasn't so rigidly curled in on herself.

Sesshoumaru sighed and tried to lean back so he could move away from her only to find that somehow, Aki had fisted her hand in the front of his clothes.

As all powerful and mighty as the youkai tended to be, he could only maintain such an awkward position for so long before it became exceedingly uncomfortable. With a sigh, Sesshoumaru laid down beside Aki, brushing aside Fred's ridiculous protests.

Fred snapped his open mouth shut. There lay _the_ Ice Prince next to his best friend on the ground in a cave. How surreal could things continue to get?

Maybe he should wait to limit surreality until after the morning. Because then Aki would be awake and likely to take Sesshoumaru's closeness badly.


	8. A Fluffy Dream

Back again! And oh so tired... but hey, exhaustion never stopped a fanfiction from being posted so long as it was already typed up.

Lets hear it for Dream Sequences! People can act as out of character and crazy and still be the same person without ruining a fic. Bah! I could be wrong, but seriously, the dream is needed. Especially because Fred isn't involved. Maybe I said too much...NAH!

Things happen in this chapter. No really, they do and some of them aren't as obviously important as others. That doesn't mean they're not important. Or does it?

don't worry, I'm not any nicer to my borrowed characters than I am to you. In fact, you should be glad you aren't subjected to the whims of me!

**A Fluffy Dream**

The subconscious mind is a complex bit of our being. Every one has one yet there's not really a lot we know about them. Some say dreams are meaningful in a purely symbolic way. Others claim that dreams are purely random images and have no meaning at all. And then one guy related everything to sex for reasons we may never really know. All we know is that strange stuff happens in our brain when we sleep and no two dreams are exactly alike.

Or are they?…

_Sesshoumaru was dreaming. He could always tell when he was dreaming, the rareness of the occurrence made it easy to identify when it happened._

_In this dream he was small, young, which was strange because he had never dreamed about being other than he was while awake. This dream was different._

_In his dream he could see a bunch of other children playing in a field under a bright blue sky. They were running around and the air was saturated with their youthful laughter._

_Chibi Sesshoumaru sneered at their game. It was a habit he'd developed when he first noticed that he was never asked to play. Nobody wanted to play with the heir of such a powerful youkai as his father. What if he got hurt? Would his father kill whomever he perceived as responsible?_

_They were afraid; he could understand that. That still didn't stop him from feeling left out. The pressure to live up to his father was already such a big part of his life that he had to do something to disguise the feeling. It wouldn't do to appear weak even at such a young age. _

_Eventually he'd managed to convince even himself that he didn't want to participate and that's why he'd never played the games or joined in with the other kids. If you tell yourself something long enough and often enough you start to believe it; isn't that how the saying goes? It helped that his training and education had started so young to help distract him. _

_But here, in this dream, it was obvious he' d never quite believed the lie. He had wanted to play; he had wanted to join in the carefree activities of the others. It was absolute proof that Sesshoumaru had very little imagination if the other kids still ignored him in his own dream._

_He suddenly found himself knocked to the ground by a strange mass coming from behind him. Sesshoumaru rolled over quickly in surprise to find himself staring up at a little girl with green eyes and a puzzled look on her face._

_"I'm sorry," she laughed gaily as she picked herself up. The girl was shorter than he was and she appeared a bit younger as well. "What are you doing up here all by yourself anyway? You can't have any fun up here by yourself." She grabbed his hand and tugged him down the hill from under the strange tree he hadn't noticed before._

_He followed that sweet little girl into the circle of children and finally got to play his first game of tag…_

Sesshoumaru smiled in his sleep and tightened his arm around Aki's waist. Some time after the inu youkai had settled to rest beside her, Aki had fully uncurled from her fetal position and stretched out to relax along the length of her guardian. Now the two lay snug against each other, sharing warmth and other things. My, but things would be interesting should one of them wake.

_The little girl caught him with a triumphant laugh. "I got you!"_

_Sesshoumaru scoffed playfully at the girl as the game continued around him. He'd learned that half-hearted denial of capture was as much a part of the game as all the rest. And all the rest of the children chased after him as often as they chased after anyone else. He truly was part of the game and he couldn't help but notice that not a one of them was scared of him. Especially not this little girl who first invited him to the game._

_Her cheerful face was healthily flushed and her bright eyes sparked with her humor and the thrill of the chase. He noted her short breath and her heaving shoulders and decided to drag her off to rest and watch the others for a while._

_She almost protested their withdrawal from the game. Tugging on his hand firmly at first before she sighed and allowed him to draw her up the hill they had started from._

_Sesshoumaru pulled her along behind him, his heart light and full. This strange little girl had gifted him with this feeling. She had drawn him to the others and somehow he was certain they'd included him just because she had brought him. _

_Sesshoumaru paused halfway up the hill when he noticed the strange tree at the summit. He hadn't noticed it before and he would've remembered seeing such a strange tree if he had._

_The little girl didn't stop with him; she kept walking until it was her leading him to rest under the branches. As he watched she appeared to grow older the closer to the summit they went. When she appeared to be the age of a human teenager he pulled her to a stop and turned to look back at the field where the other children still played. He smiled gently to himself as their laughter tickled through his ears and turned back to her. _

_She was still shorter than him, his body having aged as hers had. She squeezed his hand as she studied him._

_"Thank you," he whispered. She blinked in confusion and he just shook his head. Sesshoumaru couldn't bring himself to explain why he was thankful. It was strange for him to come across someone like her, someone who did things so precious without even realizing that such things could mean so very much._

_The youkai lowered himself to lounge in the grass and pulled her down to sit next to him overcoming her slight resistance. He cuddled her close and settled in to quietly watch the rambunctious pack of children dash about in their play._

_"They're so beautiful," She murmured gently. "I prefer to remember them like this. Children are never so carefree or happy as when they are at play."_

_Sesshoumaru frowned in confusion. "This is a memory?" he asked her gently._

_She chuckled and the sound flooded through his senses. "Not exactly," She replied. "Not all of them were children together, but I knew them as children once." She pointed to one boy with unruly hair and a warm smile. "He was only a year younger than I, whereas she," and she pointed to a little girl with pink ribbons in her hair "was seven years younger than me."_

_He understood then. She meant that she chose to remember them as carefree children and at play. And her desire to keep anyone from feeling left out or alone had made her put them all in the same game together._

_She was remarkable and he had to commend himself for dreaming her up, though it was strange for him to have done so._

Something was tickling her ear. It was damned annoying but she felt so wonderfully warm and comfortable that she hated to allow anything to wake her. Best to just brush it away before she awoke completely. Aki attempted to do just that and came instantly awake when she found her movement restricted.

Aki's eyes opened and couldn't make sense of what was right in front of her. There was a lot of white and some gray. She couldn't seem to make her eyes focus properly. At least, not for a moment before she realized that what she was looking at was a lot closer than anything should've been upon her waking.

Slowly she became more aware of herself and the position she was in. The white was the color of the silk clothing the body pressed close to her. The gray was left by the shadows the sunlight streaming in the cave mouth had painted on the fabric. The body so close to her was Sesshoumaru's, and it was his arm that held her captive against him. This was bad.

She needed to get out of this predicament, preferably without rousing the sleeping youkai. She needed to regain some personal space before her brain suffered a melt down under the urgings of that Damn witch's spell. Apparently the spell was especially fond of the demon that set it off.

Aki began the slow process of wiggling free. It wasn't so hard…Well, excepting every five minutes Sesshoumaru would reflexively tighten his arm around her. Then her mind would desert her for a few seconds in sensual bliss before she could move again.

Seriously, if this false heat didn't kill her she would still go quite happily crazy from the side effects.

Finally she stood free of Sesshoumaru and straightened the garments she wore, still trying to convince her wayward body that it really didn't want to crawl back into his grasp and let the sensual torture continue. Aki took a deep breath and turned to check her clothes. Laundry certainly wasn't stimulating, nope. She packed the dry garments up and stood carefully. Apparently her increasing temperature was starting to screw with her inner ear, the action took more care than it should.

She wanted a bath. It always felt better to be clean when one was ill, and while the hot spring sounded very appealing right now, she was better off with the stream that was both closer and cooler. Perhaps it would help with her "fever".

Aki glanced at the sleeping youkai with a sigh. He would come look for her once he found her missing; Sesshoumaru was taking his job very seriously. She would expect no different from such an incredibly serious guy. She shook her head and dug one of her newly dried flannel shirts from her bag and draped it over him. Basically she was telling him she'd be back, but she doubted he'd interpret it that way. Turning around she left the cave and headed towards the sound of moving water.

_Sesshoumaru's dream began to change. He was comfortably lying in the grass watching the game and suddenly she was no longer next to him. He'd looked around for her and gradually become aware that the sound of the children was fading as well. He glanced beck to where they had been playing just before they faded completely from the dream as well._

_Frantic now, he glanced up the hill somehow sensing the tree held importance. The tree was there, but half of it was gone and the rest was slowly fading. What was gong on?_

Sesshoumaru came awake all at once, unsure of what had awakened him and uneasy about the dream's end. Was it some strange sort of prophetic dream? The youkai shook himself away from such an absurd thought. He'd never had the gift of seeing, and for all that the dream was different it felt the same as a regular dream.

The inu youkai pulled himself up off the ground with a discreet, yet satisfying, stretch of muscles and glanced around the cave. Something appeared to be missing.

"I see she's already playing hooky this morning," a cheerful voice interrupted Sesshoumaru's perusal of the cave's shadows. He glanced in the direction of the voice to reveal that it was Fred who had spoken and he suddenly knew what was missing. "Aki slipped her leash for a bit."

Sesshoumaru mentally ran the ghost through with his claws as he stalked to the mouth of the cave and the bright sunshine.

"Hey wait a minute," Fred floated directly in front of the demon, "let her have a few minutes to herself why don't you? She's actually trying to help herself, which is a rare occurrence I might add."

Sesshoumaru drew up short at the first contact with the spirit's substance. It was a terribly uncomfortable sensation. Besides, it sounded like the ghost knew where his charge was. He gave Fred his best glare, "Where is she?" he demanded with a fierce growl.

The dead have no reason to feel intimidated by threats of violence. You certainly can't die twice, at least not without some very serious help in the resurrection department. So Fred tapped his chin pretending to think about where Aki might be and shrugged his shoulders in a way that let the youkai know he was unimpressed by the threats being thrown at him. "You know if you threaten me like that, I kind of don't want to tell you."

Sesshoumaru growled with frustration. "How am I supposed to guard her when I'm not where she is?"

"There is that," theghost nodded in agreement. "I assure you she's fine. Aki's not too far away and she is trying to bring her temperature down a little."

Sesshoumaru just growled, "Where?" He didn't care what she thought she was doing or even why she was doing it. It only mattered where she was to him.

"My but you have a one-track mind," Fred muttered snidely. "She's a bit that way," he indicated with a finger. And she was probably thoroughly undressed, he thought to himself as he made a point of getting in the determined youkai's way.

"Remove yourself from my path," Sesshoumaru snarled. The ghost was proving to be quite adept at constantly being in his way. The taiyoukai was gaining ground very, very slowly and it infuriated him to no end.

"I will not," Fred replied smugly. "I told you to leave her be for a little bit. She'll come back on her own."

"I don't know that," Sesshoumaru almost ground out but his jaw was so firmly clenched that the words would have been no more than an inarticulate growl. He most certainly did not like being thwarted by anything.

"Look, Aki left behind one of her favorite shirts so she absolutely will be back," Fred reasoned. "Can't you just wait here for her?"

It was a stupid question and even Fred knew that. Sesshoumaru took protecting Aki very seriously for some reason and the only reason the youkai hadn't already retrieved her was because of the unpleasant sensation coming in contact with a ghost caused. Fred was thankful that Aki had been right about that sort of thing.

Sesshoumaru gave an especially violent growl right before he forced himself to step through the damned spirit and get it over with.

"What the-" Fred gaped in surprise before hollering at the charging youkai. "Hey! Get back here!" It was futile now. Sesshoumaru was far faster than Fred could ever be unless he could zap himself in front of the inu youkai before he reached his friend. The chances of that working were very slim. Fred sighed; Aki wasn't going to like this.

Sesshoumaru had greatly disliked the sensation of stepping through Fred. If he were the praying sort he might actually send up a vehement prayer to whatever god that he never have to do that again. Now he just had to find the female he was supposed to be watching over and all would be back to how it should be.

Slowly he managed to pick up the sound of a gentle humming over the faint sound of running water. Apparently all he'd ever have to do to find her was to find the nearest body of water large enough for her to submerge in. He shook his head, was a cold bath really good for someone suffering from a fever? He'd never had to worry about it. His kind seldom took ill long enough for any actual treatment to be needed.

Sesshoumaru mentally sighed, Fred seemed to think so and he had been a member of a species that would know.

Sesshoumaru stepped out into the clear space by the stream so suddenly he startled Aki who had apparently been getting out. She jumped and slipped on a slick rock in the streambed. She fell back in the water and slipped under the surface for a moment. She came up coughing and cursing in pain.

Sesshoumaru was too stunned by the expanse of wet flesh he hadn't glimpsed before that he didn't really notice that her fall had scraped her elbow. He didn't notice her extremely colorful and diverse vocabulary. Nor did he notice that her bandages had been removed and some of the stitches had been as well.

In fact, he didn't even notice when Aki stopped swearing to cross her arms and glare at him. This was altogether rather bad of him. Partially because Aki huffed and turned around cutting off his wonderful view with her incredibly long hair, but mostly because it's terribly rude to stare.

Fred was terribly eager to point this out when he appeared right in front of Sesshoumaru still further blocking the youkai's view of Aki. "It's rude to stare," Fred's voice was perfectly cool. He didn't like the way this inu looked at his good friend. Aki didn't need an emotional cripple in her life and Mr. Stick-up-his-ass gave every symptom of being one.

The smallest amount of color flooded Sesshoumaru's face as he sharply turned around. He couldn't believe his own behavior. Why was he acting like some green adolescent first discovering the difference between males and females?

"You know, some people might apologize for interrupting someone else's bath," Aki grumbled quietly. She knew he could still hear her. She also knew he wouldn't apologize. She certainly didn't really expect it of him, the only reason she said anything was because it was better than staring at Sesshoumaru's back and trying to dress in record time with her balance being all screwed up. "One of these days I'll learn that really frigid, indifferent pride thing." She muttered under her breath.

"You'd never be able to pull it off," Fred declared from a bit closer than she expected. "Your face is too expressive most of the time."

"Maybe," Aki shrugged into her shirt. She glanced over at the ghost where he hovered between her and Sesshoumaru facing the other way. She folded up the silk kimono and stashed it carefully in her bag with the rest of her spare clothing. "So you just couldn't wait for me to get back to the cave," she teased.

Sesshoumaru balled up his fist in annoyance, unfamiliar with being teased by anyone. "I am supposed to watch over you until you are well," he growled as he turned to glare at her. His eyes narrowed upon glimpsing her apparel. He refused to voice his displeasure about her not wearing the silk he'd given her. He had no real right to say anything. Besides, he was supposed to be angry about something else at the moment. "I cannot watch over you when you are not present."

"I only need you to watch over me while I am being forced to sleep," Aki corrected him pointedly. "I don't appear to be unconscious anymore."

"I do not remember anybody stipulating you needed to be unconscious to need me to protect you," Sesshoumaru stated coldly.

Aki smiled at him, "It was implied."

"Aki stop instigating the youkai," Fred demanded. "Only dead people who can't get hurt get to do that."

"Like that ever stopped you when you were alive," Aki scoffed. "It's not like you can do anything to stop me now anyways."

"Oh yeah? I can sing," the ghost threatened.

"Oh god somebody drug me back to sleep," Aki shuddered.

Sesshoumaru raised a questioning eyebrow at her demanding Aki explain.

"There's no greater torture in the world for someone who can carry a tune than somebody who can't singing their heart out," she declared.

"Hee hee!" Fred laughed evilly.

"So you can sing?" Sesshoumaru asked his charge.

"What?" She asked in confusion. "Why would you ask that?"

"Yes, she can sing," Fred grinned. "She's actually very good at it."

"Well maybe I used to sing, but I don't anymore," Aki shrugged. "There's just not been much reason to recently."

"Why not?" Sesshoumaru inquired.

"Yes, why not?" a now somewhat familiar voice demanded from the opposite bank of the stream.

Sesshoumaru and Aki turned to face the newcomer only to freeze in surprise.

"This has got to be some kind of joke," Fred declared staring at the figure across the water wrapped in a baboon pelt and flower garlands. "When did Naraku start smoking crack?"

"I'm not sure if he realized that it was wearing a circlet of flowers on its head when he sent it out," Aki managed to get out around the laughter she was having trouble suppressing. "Evil shouldn't be allowed to dress up in pink and yellow flowers."

"Yeah, they should whither and blacken on contact," Fred agreed.

"Naraku must've messed up when he made this one," Aki decided.

"It's rude to say things like that, whomever you're talking about," the Naraku puppet smiled sunnily.

"Ah, too bright. Aki, are you sure it's evil?" Fred asked her playfully.

"I'm afraid so," Aki replied.

"Oh come now," the puppet laughed cheerfully. "You don't really mean that. Won't you come play with me?"

Fred burst out laughing. The puppets earnest request and indestructible good mood were too much for him.

"I'm terribly sorry," Aki replied carefully. "I'm not allowed to play today. I was hurt yesterday and my keepers wouldn't like it. Maybe some other time."

The puppet pouted but let it go. "Alright then. Bye-bye."

Sesshoumaru glanced at the female as she waved farewell to the silly demented puppet. Surely that couldn't be all that would come from the encounter. It was an instrument of Naraku wasn't it? Then again, he couldn't remember the last time he saw the mysterious bastard dressed like that.

Once the puppet was out of sight, Aki sighed and sank to the ground. "Damn puppet and damn Naraku," she muttered.

Alarmed at her strange behavior, Sesshoumaru gracefully sank to the ground also to get a closer look at her.

"What was that all about?" Fred asked, confusion thickly coating his tone.

"Naraku attempted to establish a way to watch me," Aki informed him. "I'm the only one he can't catch in Kanna's mirror so he has to find some other way to spy on me."

"And he thought that would work?" The ghost couldn't sound more incredulous.

"That could've been a very dangerous encounter," Aki returned.

"How so?" Sesshoumaru asked while studying her face.

"That puppet was made with the mentality of a child, a spoiled child at that, but at the same time it carries the same powers of destruction all of Naraku's puppets are infused with. If his request had been turned down in the wrong way…" Aki left her sentence hanging.

"So since you claimed to be too damaged to play and phrased it so that you would've played anyway if not for the people watching over you he accepted your refusal without offering violence in the way of a tantrum in return," Sesshoumaru observed.

"We should just be glad he wasn't a tired toddler child on top of being rather spoiled," Aki declared with mild humor. "He might've wound up being too much like Fred for me to handle."

"Hey!" The ghost protested the comparison.

"Or the puppet might have been like Aki," Sesshoumaru declared digging out the bag of herbs Kikyou had left with him.

Aki groaned as he produced the pouch of medicine. "Haven't I slept enough already?" she whined. Just because she'd managed to skate by one night without extensive nightmares didn't mean she would manage it again.

Sesshoumaru gave her a flat look to which she offered up a growl of frustration. She was getting tired of people interfering with her life. She didn't care that they were trying to help; she just wanted her solitude back (with only Fred as a constant interruption).

Lucky for Sesshoumaru, Aki didn't make him force it down her throat. It would've been terribly difficult to do with one arm, but he would've managed it even so. But he didn't have too. Instead, Aki dug out a cup of her own and he poured both the powder and some water into it. She choked down the disgustingly gritty drink with a grimace. "Bleh! That's worse than applesauce!" she declared with feeling.

He poured her more water for her to drink down before rising to his feet. A few drops of fresh moisture dropped on Sesshoumaru's head and he turned to glare at Aki as he pulled her to her feet. "Why do you insist on being caught in the rain?" he demanded rhetorically.

She glared back at him, "I certainly wasn't planning to still be outside right now, you jerk. If you had waited back in the cave I would be there right now and not in danger of being soaked to the skin for the second time in as many days."

"You should have stayed in the cave to begin with," Sesshoumaru growled as he tugged her in the direction of the cave.

"If I had stayed in the cave I wouldn't have been able to lower my temperature any now would I?" Aki returned cuttingly.

"You two fight like an old married couple," Fred declared, refusing to be forgotten.

"Shut up Fred!" Aki ordered the ghost sharply.

The rain picked up speed and followed through with the threat to soak them to the skin.


	9. One Way to Get Warm

I thought I would post this a little early because I don't get out of work until a bit late tomorrow and I know how antsy some people can get when waiting for things. My most constant reviewer has taken to always demanding I update soon. TeeHee. You'd think my schedule was obvious by now.

Okay, fun things happen in this chapter. And yes, the title does have something to do with it. But again I would like to stress that there is no lemon. As fun as it would be for there to be a lemon here,I have no experience in that department. That's right, I'm a 24 year old virgin, and liable to stay that way for a long time. Besides, I think certain things should be kept private and I figure this is my way of making it up to my favorite Character. She should be the only one privy to what Sesshoumaru does to her, right?

Oh and we meet Sesshoumaru's former nanny in this chapter. It's not a particularly significant introduction just yet, but she's still cool anyway.

And did I mention that Fred doesn't like Sesshoumaru? Thankfully the feeling is mutual for our entertainment.

I've finished writing part four, and so long as I type it all up, there should be no delay between the end of part three and part four. But that's a long ways into the future.

Here's a question: Would anyone like for me to post my outline for this fic? Because I actually have one and I try to keep it up to date as to which chapter I'm working on. It might likewise help keep chapters and storyline straight.

A couple chapters back I failed to make mention of a third reviewer. This might be because it was hard to tell if the review was good or bad. As I was telling my friend, I can't really tell if it's a reluctant compliment or a veiled insult. Heh! I read her profile page and I would have to say it's most likely a reluctant compliment and I'm flattered she even took the time to read this fic. Thanks again for the review!

I'll be sure to let Rumiko Takahashi know that I'm not completely off in my interpretation of her characters despite how difficult it is to grasp Sesshoumaru's fluffy atire and run with it.

**One Way to Get Warm**

When rain is feeling a bit vindictive, you know it. You know it in the way the clothes you were wearing go from being perfectly dry to absolutely soaked through in a single second. You know it in the way the rain decides to suddenly change the rules and comes at you from one side and then the other in a matter of synapse pulses in your brain. And the worst thing about when the rain decides to be vindictive, you have absolutely no defense from it beyond staying indoors and praying the precipitation doesn't decide to just kick the door down and prove just how inadequate a door is as a defense.

Unfortunately, Caves without doors weren't much of a defense either, but at least once they were deep enough into the cave they could find some respite from the pounding drops of water.

It had taken far longer to find the cave than it should have. They were completely soaked through. Sesshoumaru was chilled to the bone and could only imagine what such a chill could do to Aki in her condition.

The sedative was taking effect with a vengeance and Aki could barely keep her eyes open. So when they got inside the cave she didn't care that she was drenched to the skin. She curled up in a ball and passed out.

Her sudden decent into somnolence was not a particularly comforting event under normal circumstances. Sesshoumaru's worry increased exponentially when he realized that Aki's fever had gotten much worse since the night before. Her breathing was raspy and labored and he was certain being stuck in wet clothes could only worsen her condition.

He looked around their temporary shelter in a vain attempt to find something helpful and amazingly discovered the cave wasn't as horribly empty of useful items as he thought. His gaze had landed on the shirt Aki had left behind; the same shirt that Fred had been harping was her promise to return.

By some piece of elusive good luck the bit of fabric had been discarded far enough inside the cave to avoid the rain. Apparently, it was the last piece of good luck Sesshoumaru was going to receive because he couldn't get Aki to wake up.

If Aki wouldn't wake, then she couldn't dress herself in the new shirt. Sesshoumaru certainly couldn't do it; he only had one arm. Even if he could somehow find a way to change her clothes without her conscious help, he would have had a hard time making himself do it. One simply didn't go around ripping the clothes off unsuspecting females. It just wasn't done.

True, no one else was likely to ever know, but Sesshoumaru would know and that was more than his fine sensibilities and ironclad sense of honor could take. The fact that he was even considering it made him slightly ill. It didn't matter why he was contemplating it. It didn't matter that changing Aki's clothes was for her own good, it still seemed wrong to him.

Not that it mattered. Sesshoumaru wasn't going to cut her clothes off with his claws in any case. For one, he couldn't imagine the fit she would throw upon discovering he had destroyed her clothes on top of rendering her naked. For another, he was pretty certain her being wholly unclothed would not exactly be an improvement upon her wearing her wet garments. Even if he used the dry shirt to cover her like a blanket.

Besides, what if he really did have to defend her? For some reason the thought of some unnamed foe catching a glimpse of Aki's exposed flesh didn't sit well with him. Worse, what if he had to move her? Even Sesshoumaru could see that there was no way for him to carry her unconscious form and keep the dry garment covering her well enough to protect her from exposure. She would just have to survive in her wet clothes for now. Besides, it wasn't like they could stay wet forever.

He would just wait until the rain stopped then set them both out in the sun to help dry their clothes on their bodies. Sesshoumaru was convinced the rain couldn't continue to pound incessantly for too long.

Through it all Fred watched. He watched as the youkai found Aki's sole piece of dry clothing. He watched as Sesshoumaru attempted to wake his best friend. He watched as the demon puzzled over how to fix the problem upon realizing that Aki could not be awakened. And through it all, Fred's eyes were glued to the piece of fabric as Sesshoumaru's clothing dripped wetly onto the garment clasped in his clawed fist.

The ghost very much doubted that Sesshoumaru realized that he had made it absolutely impossible to still call the shirt 'dry'. Eventually the youkai sighed at the inevitable conclusion that Aki would just have to stay in her wet clothes for the time being. Fred rolled his eyes at how long it had taken the demon lord to concede to the unavoidable reality of the situation.

Fred did not like how things were playing out, but like Aki sometimes said, you didn't have to like how things were going in order for them to be real. He knew Aki needed someone, someone alive, to break through all the barriers standing between her and the world. He knew it, just like he knew she wouldn't willingly allow that to happen. In closing herself off she was protecting the world around her from the curse that had wiped out everything that had ever been important to her life.

It saved the world but left her stuck in a prison of bad memories and nightmarish emotional pain. She hung on to life by shear stubbornness and a strong desire to fulfill the promises she made to herself. And Fred could see her dieing slowly, an inch at a time.

Aki needed someone to make her want to live, to give her hope that there could be joy in her future and Fred was desperate to find the person to make it happen. He wasn't desperate enough to want that someone to be the emotionally constipated, effeminate, arrogant jackass Sesshoumaru. In fact, he was pretty sure the youkai lord would cause more harm than good for his hurting friend.

But the ghost had seen enough to see he wasn't going to get what he wanted. Aki wouldn't let anyone near her long enough for it to do her any good and only somebody like Sesshoumaru was pompous enough to resist her pushing him away. And he could see that the inu youkai in question was drawn to the partial youkai. Oh Fred could see where this was going, he could only hope that Aki didn't pay for it in the way he thought she would.

In the meantime, he could make a right nuisance of himself. He didn't care much for Sesshoumaru and his behavior towards ghosts in general. It was rather satisfying to annoy the hell out of the youkai lord and know that nothing could be done in retaliation. And an annoyed Sesshoumaru was a distracted Sesshoumaru. Distracted from his strange ruminations about Aki and her damp clothing.

Besides, Fred didn't want to think too much about Aki, or more specifically that her body was curled up in the youkai's lap. It was altogether better for everybody involved if all thought were focused on something other than the former English teacher and her soggy, feverish state of being.

Three days passed in this way without much change. Fred still didn't like Sesshoumaru. Sesshoumaru still greatly disliked the ghost. Aki was still unconscious. What's more, the rain never stopped and the youkai and his charge were still soaked to the bone.

Some things did change as is likely to happen in the space of three days. Aki's fever got worse as true sickness rose up to mix with the side effects of the witch's spell. Her breathing never eased and Sesshoumaru grew more and more concerned for her health.

The feeling was only intensified when the silly little water fed crevice in the back of the cave overflowed with the intent to flood the entire cave. Sesshoumaru had been forced to lift Aki onto a rocky ledge in the cave wall where he had to hover uncomfortably above her in order to fit them both onto the narrow space that offered the only haven from the icy water. As if that weren't enough, the saturated dirt above the ledge finally grew too heavy to stay where it was and caved in – right onto his head.

He was wet. He was filthy. And the only light in the misery of the past few days had been that Aki had been saved from further injury, even if it had been because his head was in the way.

Through it all, Aki never stirred. She showed no signs of waking. She made no restless movement in her sleep. The only proof that she was merely sleeping and not beyond the ability to wake was hernear constant coughing that brought up more tainted blood. Sesshoumaru was certain he never wanted to use his poison claw ever again. He was sick of the smell.

He was almost certain he would rather Aki slip into a sleep that was almost impossible to awake from instead of continuing to cough up blood.

Sesshoumaru had decided it was more than time to get out of the cave. He was tired of being damp. He wanted to be warm again. He wanted to be dry, and he wanted the same for Aki. It shouldn't have mattered that much to him, but the girl in his dreams had been growing progressively more tired looking and short of breath as Aki grew more and more ill. It didn't take a genius to make the connection.

Aki was the girl in his dream and he had decided that the first person to treat him to the youthful pleasures he'd been denied in his youth deserved some kind of consideration from him. Besides, watching over her as the others had appointed him to had to include protecting against death by illness.

It wasn't like moving her through the rain would chill her anymore than keeping her stationary in a cave did. He truly hadn't expected to be away from Rin this long and he was certain that after collecting the child and his retainer he could get Aki to shelter quickly. Quick enough to avoid all encounters that could delay getting her to their final destination.

Sesshoumaru shoved his feet into the ankle deep frigid water on the floor of the cave with an internal grimace. Transporting Aki did present a few problems, but none of them were great enough for him to further risk her health by staying. True, he couldn't carry Aki the way he had before without a small amount of her help that could only be offered by a conscious female. True, it was difficult to hold her bag open and stuff what few items had been taken out back into it, but he managed. Granted it wasn't the neatest packing job and he was pretty sure Aki would not be happy to be slung over his shoulder if she should awake mid transport, but that was unlikely and it was the best he could do under the circumstances.

Sesshoumaru checked the cave one last time for anything belonging to Aki before promptly turning and striding out the cave mouth and into the still pounding rain. He nearly winced as the driven water dug into his muscles uncomfortably. The wince was more for Aki than himself though. She was fully exposed to the rains biting touch whereas he was partially shielded by her weight.

With a flick of his wet silver hair, Sesshoumaru flashed out of the area leaving behind a frustrated ghost to curse after him.

Fred was absolutely certain that Sesshoumaru wasn't going to stop and let him catch up periodically like Aki did. Which meant that the ghost was going to take even longer to get to Aki when the taiyoukai finally reached his destination. The spirit's cursing continued nonstop for quite a while. And since he's quite fully entertained by himself no one needed to pay him any real heed.

Sesshoumaru was finding that his ward and retainer had not remained where he left them.

Normally he would be terribly annoyed by this blatant disregard of his very specific orders, but Jaken and Rin had moved towards his ultimate goal so he might be able to overlook it for now. Not that Sesshoumaru was wholly conscious of his thought on the subject. He was much too focused on getting Aki out of the weather.

For some strange reason the taiyoukai couldn't form true coherent thoughts under the urgency he felt to get Aki somewhere she could be looked after properly. He couldn't seem to forget even momentarily his burden was suffering in the weather and still completely unconscious. Sesshoumaru couldn't escape the nearly overwhelming desire to see her open those unique green eyes of her own will.

Under this slightly unconscious need to see Aki well and as soon as could possibly be arranged Sesshoumaru pressed himself to speeds he'd never accomplished before. Had he stopped to think about it, he would've flayed himself alive for achieving this now when he was goaded by emotions he shouldn't be feeling rather than when he normally pressed himself for excellence. Luckily, Sesshoumaru was in too much of a hurry to stop and think about it.

When he made it through the gates of his family seat he barely had the strength to order the servants to look after Aki before he collapsed in an impossibly dignified way. This one time he was glad he hadn't managed to dismiss all of the staff that had served his father's second love. They were the only ones likely to know how to treat an illness of any kind. He could only hope that Aki was human enough for their prior experience to actually mean something significant for her health.

Sesshoumaru's watchful eyes never left Aki's limp form until she was taken out of sight to a destination unknown. Once she was out of view he let out a sigh of relief so out of character his servants temporarily fled a small distance before realizing he wasn't about to attack them.

The exhausted inu youkai might have fallen completely unconscious right then if it weren't for the constant irritant found in the person of his retainer. Why his father had chosen Jaken to serve him Sesshoumaru would never understand, and his promise not to kill the little imp once and for all still kept him from exterminating the annoying creature with the foul stench and inflated opinion of his own worth. On some level Sesshoumaru suspected Aki would approve of this ingrained behavior. She didn't seem to pursue violence with as much zeal most would find in a youkai, partial or otherwise.

Unfortunately, It was times like these when he cursed the day he ever promised to let the toady live. Jaken was barking out orders to the servants who were trying somewhat unsuccessfully to get their lord warmed and cleaned and dried. The servants did not need his direction. They were well trained. And certainly, none of them were deaf, as Jaken's volume seemed to indicate.

Eventually Sesshoumaru's already frayed nerves and exhausted patience snapped and he knocked the retainer unconscious leaving himself and the skilled servants to do their work in peace. In his exhausted state, the young lord barely noticed the smug smiles the servants attempted to disguise at his action, but since not a one of them moved any less efficiently than before he let it slide. Besides, there was some comfort in knowing he wasn't the only one to find the little youkai tiresome.

Elsewhere in the building there were servants who worked without the harassment of greenish imps with delusions of grandeur. Instead Sesshoumaru's staff worked under the strong will of the very capable housekeeper and head of the women's side of the estate in place of Sesshoumaru's as yet unfound Lady. And Tama knew how to deal with human ailment, having personally looked after the late Lord's Izayoi before his untimely demise that made Sesshoumaru a lord and Inuyasha fatherless.

Oh yes, Tama knew how to deal with illness. She also knew how to deal with an unconscious body that needed to be cleaned and warmed and dried. Being the resident nanny for so many years can teach a body many things. Things the raising of children of any species will teach.

Aki's unconsciously limp body was treated rather roughly in comparison to how one might treat a child's in such a case. After all, once asleep everything is done to keep a child asleep. In the case of this as yet unnamed female their lord had brought home, Tama was determined to wake the girl up. Sesshoumaru had never brought home any creature other than Aki. Rin came with the toad, Jaken and had never been inside the family holding before. But Aki had been brought in by the young lord that Tama had seen in diapers and Tama was quite protective of all the children she had looked after.

That aside, the girl's appearance begged that she had been unconscious and ill for some days, quite enough time to develop a substantial hunger. A state of being that can be dangerous in youkai for two reasons. First is the obvious weakening a lack of sustenance can cause over time. The second is that youkai who are greatly hungered can attack without warning to fill the emptiness knawing at their insides. It was an instinctual reaction that often turned out badly, especially among strangers like this foreigner was.

Tama directed her underlings to undress the shivering, slowly warming foundling in their care to be bathed. How this female could have drawn Sesshoumaru's attention as filthy as she currently was Tama couldn't imagine. Usually he was rigorously fastidious, the company of Jaken was the only flaw in his incredibly clean appearance. Inu youkai's sensitive olfactory nerves practically required such behavior. Anyone who didn't practice a similar hygiene regimen did not spend a great deal of time breathing around an inu.

At least they didn't unless they held some importance or generally were cleaner than circumstances have contrived to allow them to be at the time. Tama clucked at the slowly rousing female soothingly as she scrubbed the stunning mass of hair from scalp to tip. Under the grime the old goat youkai could tell that this stranger certainly did take better care of it when she wasn't being kept unconscious by injury and malady.

Tama and the rest of her team of servants finished scrubbing Aki down to the reddened, warming skin before removing her from the tub of water and roughly chaffing her tender skin with coarse absorbent cloth before depositing her not so limp body on a warm soft cushion next to a low table.

Aki no longer slouched as much as she would've before her somewhat brutal bath. She was slightly more awake than she expected to be but the fuzzy feeling in her brain kept her from resenting the fact. Oh but she was tired and amazingly, a little hungry as the smell of Japanese soft rice steamed into her sinuses.

It was bland but warm and safe to eat as the strange horned woman spooned it into her mouth with slightly more force than was necessary. Tama took this opportunity to observe the female's many physical oddities.

Now, Tama was used to the various extra appendages certain youkai can sport in their guise as humans. She herself wore her horns with pride, but Aki, in all Tama's experience, was the weirdest looking creature she'd ever seen. No one had ever borne both scaled tail and feathered wings in her times. And never had the old nanny come across a youkai that carried talons and the same fleshy ears some inu youkai did. And her eyes were the wrong colour for any of her "extras" as the humans would call them.

Perhaps it was her many oddities in appearance that had drawn her lord's attention to this still drowsy partial youkai; he always was a strange child.

Not that it mattered much to Tama. The old goat youkai set aside the bowl of soft rice and reached across the table to seize the girl's chin firmly. She gave her captive a short shake to garner the female's undivided attention. "Listen you! You are a guest of this house and you will be safe here. However," Tama gave Aki another shake, "if you are ever the cause of harm befallen the master of this house, I will personally see to it that you live just long enough to regret whatever action you took to cause it!"

Aki blinked in dumbfounded surprise. Had some strange goat woman just threatened her? When had she fallen into the twilight zone again?

In the end Aki dismissed it all as unimportant when compared to the sleepy fog her now clean, warm body was foisting on her mind. Her elevated temperature was still on the rise, but Tama barely gave it any heed because of the bath water and the good scrubbing the girl had received. Her skin was flushed and tender. She felt achy and when the old goat woman lead her to bed and let her crawl in, Aki could barely tell that it was meant to be soft, but she was too exhausted to care.

Back home with the taiyoukai, Sesshoumaru was likewise warm and dry and quite pleased with his former inability to be completely rid of all his father's servants. Just the knowledge that Tama was still chatelaine settled his mind like no other reassurances could.

The remembrance had come to him in the middle of his bath and the resulting complete relaxation of the previously tensed muscles in his body had quite seriously alarmed his attendants. He was so at ease that Sesshoumaru didn't really mind that they hauled him out of the water sooner than he otherwise might have preferred.

Just as he finished dressing, that same goat youkai entered the room with a tray of food to break his fast. Sesshoumaru hadn't really eaten since before Aki had been placed into his protection and such a long space between meals wasn't generally a good thing. But Tama had anticipated his need without any prompting. This was the sign of a truly skillful servant and housekeeper.

Tama stayed only long enough to watch every morsel disappear from the tray before removing it and sending the servants on their way before her. Sesshoumaru desired quiet repose and the old youkai had foreseen his wishes and worked toward allowing him that goal.

Sesshoumaru certainly hoped he was not always so horribly predictable. True routine was good for discipline, but predictability was a weakness easily exploited.

The youkai lord mentally sighed and retreated to the room that held his well-cushioned futon. In truth he couldn't truly consider the subject as fatigued as he was. Strangely, he was looking forward to the helpless hours in his near future. Perhaps the Aki-child was there waiting for him.

Sesshoumaru drew back the bed coverings and lowered himself into their soft embrace. A moment later he realized that there was another body under the blankets. He sat up and drew down the coverings one more time to expose the flesh of Aki's back and face as she lounged comfortably on her stomach. As he watched, she cracked one eye open briefly and upon observing him gently slid it closed again.

Aki for her part had not been able to return to the dark shores of sleep. Every time she began to drift off she would shiver just violently enough to wake her back up, but she was too warm and too clean to get frustrated about it. Besides, allowing the involuntary movement of her own body to frustrate her would only wake her up more completely, the opposite of what she wanted.

Sesshoumaru gazed upon her in surprise and a swell of relief. She was finally conscious. The passing thought as to why Tama had placed the girl in his bed was swiftly discarded after the realization that Aki was quite undressed. Suddenly his hand was no longer under his conscious control.

The taiyoukai watched as the appendage grazed though the air above Aki's pinkish skin mesmerized by it's journey over a territory he didn't yet dare to traverse in full until she shivered violently in the cool air. His fingers came in contact with her warmed skin so suddenly and accidentally it sent a jolt of electricity through him that took his breath away.

Suddenly his brain caught up with what was going on a moment after his hand pushed forward to fully lie upon her skin. After that, his brain didn't stand a chance. Instinct overruled all conscious thought as he leaned into her, making a claim he had never realized he wanted to make.

The night closed around them and the Urasei's spell was finally appeased.


	10. Lets Complicate Things

And We're Back! Is it just me or do commercial breaks seem to be getting longer and longer? heehee, whatever.

Hanako makes an appearance in this chapter and Tama gets to torment Sesshoumaru a little bit, though he kind of brought it on himself. Fred learns that being a ghost doesn't mean that nothing can stop him from going where he wants to. Even so, he gets in a lot of words to annoy and confuse dear fluffy. Which isn't that hard considering Sesshoumaru doesn't talk a lot, in my book that means he thinks instead. Therefore we get a lot of what Sesshoumaru is thinking about.

Morning afters are a lot of fun to write, despite me not having ever had one myself. They're even more fun when the parties involved didn't exactly think a great deal about what they were getting themselves into, but then, who ever does.

In any case, the characters of Rumiko Takahashi aren't particularly known for thinking ahead as demonstrated by Inuyasha's inability to plan for the future.

**Let's Complicate Things**

Aki was lost. She was awake, though she kept her eyes tightly closed. Her skin was cool where the air could reach it. Which was just about everywhere that wasn't covered by the possessive arm sprawled across her front and the tangle of blankets around her knees. She was cold, though the chill wasn't produced by a fever and it wasn't the cold the blasted spell had left behind. In all actuality, the room wasn't that cold either. She was merely feeling the chill of exposure, the kind of emotional and mental exposure left after all her careful walls constructed between her tender heart and the world she dared not love were torn down to leave her defenseless.

Perhaps it wasn't her that was left defenseless really. She had always been a particularly affectionate person; full of love for almost anyone she met and spent time with. It was probably why all of her friends had met the same eventual end as her family had. If she wasn't so prone to loving her friends the same as she loved her family, they might have been spared. But since Aki had no real control of her tendency to care too much about the people she knew, she erected her walls to shield everyone she didn't know from becoming someone she did know and cared about.

It was a terrible sacrifice on her part. She had never lived without caring deeply about someone before. It was an integral part of her and to deny it was kin to severing a limb. Not unlike the trapped fox gnawing off a limb to break free, Aki had locked herself away to escape the possibility and guilt of allowing anyone else to fall to her curse. A promise made becomes a promise painfully kept.

Now she lay exposed, her heart no longer squeezed inside the confines of her self-made prison and the terrible fear ran rampant in her mind. And having Sesshoumaru's arm cuddling her closer in response to some unconscious sense of her unease wasn't helping her any, despite his intention.

What Aki needed to do was rebuild her reinforced partitions, closing her off from the people around her. She currently held no greater need. Still, she glanced up at the big reason for her silently fearful ponderings. She knew that blocking him out after their shared intimacy would be near impossible now.

Aki had never shared such intimacy with anyone else in her life and she had still loved greatly and painfully all in her acquaintance. How could she not then develop feelings (if she hadn't already) for the person with whom she had shared such an experience? She couldn't block him out. Her gaze turned sad, so she would simply have to avoid him and any further contact would not take place. She would not allow another to fall to her curse least of all someone connected and relied upon by so many others.

In order to follow through with her decision she would need to heal quickly and most likely avoid further conversation with her host and his people. Aki sighed, that was easier said than done. She couldn't be rude to anyone, though as an American in Japan it was almost expected by the Natives through either misunderstanding or a slight ignorance of the local custom. And Very likely Sesshoumaru was not going to allow her to escape just like that, she'd had enough experience with him to know that much, even if he didn't recognize her from their previous encounters.

With a sigh, Aki released her troubling thoughts into the void as unconsciousness claimed her once again.

Directly on the heels of Aki's descent into dreamland, Sesshoumaru cracked open his brilliant eyes to the morning sun that was sliding sneakily into the room. He drew the warm body beside him closer to his chest allowing a small curvature of his lips to tease his mouth. Amazingly he was feeling perfectly content with his actions of the previous night, and not yet ready to move past them.

It was wonderful to awaken with a warm body beside him, one that had offered him nothing but companionship and pleasure in the time they'd spent together. He didn't need to be wary of the unconscious female by his side; she could not harm him. Aki had to have been greatly weakened by her bought of illness and lack of nourishment over the past few days. Not that she would have wanted to cause him harm even if she could. It was not her way.

There was something overwhelmingly joyous about knowing he could be with her and never have to worry about her ulterior motives. Aki had none. AS Sesshoumaru understood it, she did not desire wealth or power the way that most others did. As evinced by her handing over her collection of Shikon shards to the hanyou's wench without so much as an argument. Neither did she particularly desire companionship, as her technical innocence would suggest. Likewise her insistence on traveling and fighting alone bespoke her desire to maintain a solitary existence.

HE was pretty sure that she had not particularly desired _his_ company as she had quite plainly tried to avoid it so there was no real chance that she had planned to seduce her way into his life. She was impossibly honest in a contradictory sort of way. Meaning she never lied about anything but her own health, which was quite enough to lie about in his opinion. She did not truly lie but merely mangled the truth just enough to make it nearly impossible to detect. And for all her honesty, she didn't always tell the whole truth especially when no one had asked for it in the first place. Sesshoumaru could never be quite sure if she was truly all right or not unless she collapsed and proved herself to be very ill.

Aki was an enigma beyond the ability of even his elevated levels of comprehension. Her mystifying ability to disguise or block her scent from even his superior sense of smell made her even more difficult to understand. A most intriguing puzzle, and all his for the time being. Even if he never did learn all her secrets, there were other things he could do with their time.

Sesshoumaru pulled her even closer with his arm and Aki rolled away from him in her sleep. Her unconscious action gave him pause. Perhaps he would not have as much time as he thought. Youkai did have one-night stands upon occasion, but it was very rare. Youkai have long memories and they live for a long time. One never knew just who could mean the difference between life and death in the far distant future, so one was very careful about offending one's lovers.

Mating contracts were serious business. Both parties involved had to know the rules and there were contracts of varying degrees. Sesshoumaru had initiated a contract of the lowest degree. A rather low-class description would be that they had decided to "practice" the act that would eventually aid in procreation. Neither party would conduct affairs outside of the pair if there was mutual respect and honor. Either one of them could end it at any time, which would be followed by a grace period in which neither party pursued a sexual liaison with anyone else.

That was how it was done to avoid hurt feelings or injured pride. It was why single night romps seldom occur. He certainly hoped this wasn't one of them.

Sesshoumaru's eyes briefly burned over with a bestial red. No, this wouldn't be like that; he wouldn't allow it.

Subconsciously the inu youkai had grown far too attached to allow Aki to just slip away after such a brief taste of her life's cup. She healed him and inspired him to deep contemplation over things that had nothing to do with his dull life. She made him question himself about insignificant things and instinctually he knew that he needed that in his life. Besides, he didn't really need the pain a separation and contract severance would cause right now and he didn't think Aki did either.

Then again…

Aki was constantly in a great deal of emotional pain already if her pet ghost was to be believed. Could she handle that added pain a separation would cause? Would she even notice it with all the other pain she continually endured?

A sharp pain seized his heart, somehow he could see that fear of pain is not something that could hold her in place with anyone. She could decide to leave and that would be the end of it. What would he do if she _did_ decide to leave? The unnamed fear in his heart resolved into concrete decision. If she tried to leave, he would simply hunt her down. End of story.

Sesshoumaru sighed. It wasn't good to contemplate such serious and depressing things upon first awakening. He sat up as Aki rolled further away from him restlessly. He lifted his arm to draw the blankets up and paused to watch the goose flesh creep over the newly exposed flesh. It was a fascinating thing to watch as, to his knowledge, no demon ever got goose bumps like that. Strange.

Sesshoumaru pulled the covers up to preserve the rest of her warmth before slipping out of the futon. He pulled on some clothing and crossed over to the sheltered balcony/porch that looked over the view. His rooms were built so that they drew even with the cliff face underneath him. The drop off afforded a stunning view bathed in sunlight only slightly blocked by the mostly transparent Fred who was barely kept from frothing at the mouth. The only thing keeping the ghost from it was his being dead.

"Do you have any idea of the ramifications of your actions?" The dead human exploded. "You bastard! You'd better have a damn good reason for this buster. She deserves better. A _lot_ better!"

Sesshoumaru was quite honestly taken by surprise. He couldn't remember the last time some human had taken to scolding him about anything, let alone actions they hadn't been present for. At least he hoped Fred hadn't been present for them, it was hard to tell with ghosts. Which was part of why he was so surprised, Fred wasn't just a human; he was a dead human.

Sesshoumaru's wayward thoughts about the oddity of being scolded by a dead human allowed him to miss some of Fred's tirade. "-bastard. That girl in there voluntarily walled off the world to protect it from her and there you go all wrecking it. And for what? Do you even have a reason for what you did? It better be something more substantial than 'she was there'!" Fred continued nonstop. He didn't have to stop for anything because he didn't have to breath. "Because if Aki can't shut everybody out again she'll wind up breaking her promise and allowing somebody to die by her curse again. Then she'll really die!" the ghost moaned horrifically. Apparently being dead did not mean you lost your sense of drama. "She can't take anymore death like that."

Sesshoumaru mentally snorted before cutting into the tide of Fred's words. "I am no mere human to be taken down so easily by some mysterious curse!" he declared with feeling.

The ghost glared at his interruption. "Oh really?" Fred growled. "Do you remember what I told you about Aki's nightmares? About how she found her family, all dead? Do you? Aki may have been raised human, she may even be part human, but she's the only one who survived. The human family died and she found them. Her friends all died, and she was unable to say good-bye. Did you think that through all that her birth family would have left her to suffer alone if they had survived?" Fred harrumphed at the thought. "I've met her blood relations. They're all dead, killed by that same curse you think _you'll_ be able to live through. Aki's birth mother was a full-blooded demoness and quite powerful. Her grandmother was even more powerful and she succumbed as well. It doesn't speak well for your curse resistant powers now does it!"

Sesshoumaru blinked, stunned. A curse had wiped out an entire youkai family? It was unheard of! Impossible, he would've heard something about it, and yet… He'd never known the dead to lie about death. The again, he'd never had a ghost chew him out before either.

Everything about Aki was strange. The company she keeps could not be matched for their uniqueness. The strange things that occurred around her were unimaginable. But nothing was more odd than the girl herself. That reminded him.

"Just how human is she?" Sesshoumaru asked, completely derailing Fred's train of thought.

"Huh?" the ghost articulated in the most unsophisticated manner.

"Aki, how human is she?" he reiterated. He hated to repeat himself. "She seems completely youkai at times, and then she proves to have some subtle human behavior that no youkai could fabricate."

Fred blinked at the taiyoukai. "It depends. What type of answer do you want? Physically, there's not really enough human in her to shake a stick at. She could even have a true demonic form like we've heard you do. We're not sure. All her demon attributes have yet to manifest themselves. It may take years to figure everything out." Fred paused before continuing, "Psychologically and emotionally, she's very human. Up until just a few months ago when we had a run in with a rather sadistic witch we thought she _was_ human. So that's how she thinks and acts, like a human. It's rather difficult to change that part of yourself, and I really don't see Aki ever doing so. Being raised human does leave an indelible mark on a personality." Fred grinned, "Even as a human she defied classification. She's not good or evil, human or youkai, she simply is."

Sesshoumaru sighed as it slowly sank in that Aki most likely didn't know a thing about youkai society and customs. Oh was his future ever looking messed up right now! He winced internally as the ghost returned to his previous train of thought rather loudly. The worst thing about it was that he couldn't just kill the little annoyance like the inu youkai normally could.

Sesshoumaru retreated into the room where he had slept only to find it terrifyingly empty. Aki was not where he had left her.

No Aki had awakened almost the moment after he had stepped into Fred's raging storm of scolding words. Aki didn't want to hear it. She didn't want to know what they were talking about, even if it was about her. So she forced herself out of the very inviting blankets and into the not-so-warm clothing that had been left for her. Then she retreated back into the room that had been home to her bath the night before.

Sesshoumaru didn't know this, all he knew was that the room was now empty and he couldn't find a scent to follow or any indication as to where she might have gone.

Fred still hadn't missed a beat in his continued angry diatribe on his friend's behalf. He knew where Aki was. He always knew, she was his anchor, his link to the living world. It would take more than the worst Naraku could come up with to remove the knowledge from Fred. It just didn't occur to him that Sesshoumaru might be fretting about where she was. After all, he was very into his vituperation of the prior evening's last events. He simply hadn't noticed the inu youkai's strange behavior, not that it was particularly pronounced.

Luckily for Sesshoumaru, his eyes were drawn to the partially opened entryway of the chamber alongside of his usual dressing room. He had almost forgotten about the room hidden behind that screen door.

Aki had apparently disappeared into the inner sanctum reserved for the dressing and/or resting of ladies. Sesshoumaru had never been allowed into one of these special rooms when there was any reason to want to before. The ladies then had been his father's and he; a child in the eyes of society had no right to enter them. Not that it kept him from trying; he was a taiyoukai's son after all. Nobody told Sesshoumaru what he couldn't do. At least that's what he had thought at the time. Apparently, he was wrong, as Tama had proven both proficient in keeping him out and strangely omniscient in her ability to do so.

Now He sought entrance to that mysterious room. Now he had a reason and a right. All this passed through Sesshoumaru's mind as he strode to slide into the sun drenched alcove in search of his guest.

There was Aki, apparently unconscious on a pile of cushions. A half eaten tray of cold meats and other light fare sat next to her on a low table. Sesshoumaru couldn't help but offer up thanks to whatever might hear. Aki had eaten, she had been hungry and that could only be a good sign in his mind. He slowly approached her lounging body craving to touch her without disturbing her slumber. Besides, he argued childishly with himself, Aki was improperly dressed and obviously needed somebody to raise the cloth from its precarious position of nearly exposing part of her chest. He just wanted to ensure nobody saw more than they should, peaking wasn't part of his agenda, really.

"Leave her alone, Sesshoumaru-sama," Tama's soft voice came from behind him shocking the still ranting Fred into silence as well. "You'll disturb her."

Sesshoumaru tensed up from a thousand remembered encounters in this very room when he was young. He forced himself to relax. He was no longer a boy; he was lord here and Aki was his lady now. He had a right to be in this room like his father had before him. Besides none of his other run ins with Tama had included her talking to him before removing him bodily from his trespassing.

Tama's eyes flashed at the ghost before glancing back to Sesshoumaru's. She was asking if he desired the ghost's removal. Internally he grinned at the thought of Fred's eviction but he knew batter than to actually do it. He had to tread carefully around Aki until he knew just how much work he had to do to keep her. It wouldn't do to immediately alienate her simply because he didn't like her pet ghost.

Fred ignored their exchange. He was too busy wondering why Aki was faking sleep. The ghost knew there had to be a reason and whatever it was couldn't be good.

Aki for her part was debating whether or not she should notify the people in the room with her of the holy terror coming there way. She groaned internally. At this very moment she was annoyed with every one of them and couldn't care less one way or the other, but it would be rather bad to greet the incoming problem on her back.

With a bone weary sigh Aki hauled herself to her feet. She pointedly stared at the outer door where the oncoming footsteps tripped over Rin as the little girl was coming to visit her Sesshoumaru-sama. The former English tutor winced for the little girl but could spare her no more thought as the erstwhile imposition entered the room.

Fred's groan was lost under the new comer's outburst. "Aki-sama, I heard how badly you'd been injured," the long eared chibi overwhelmed all the available space left in the room. "When I found out they'd left you, I had to come. If only I had been there! You wouldn't have been hurt at all! Kagome's mother sent these," and the rabbit demon promptly changed Aki's clothes so fast it was like they simply manifested on her frame. "She was worried, as was I. And Kaede sent you this," a package thumped solidly against Aki's constricted chest as Hanako continued in her self-important worried rant.

Kagome's mother, as dear as she was, didn't exactly get Aki's size right. Mrs. H. hadn't really seen Aki since her run in with the Urasei and so the wardrobe she'd chosen to send was sized to match the frame Aki no longer had. A frame that was a great deal shorter, less muscular and not quite so busty. Aki was being forced to look like a badly dressed Barbie doll and couldn't breathe. The only thing good about this situation was that only Fred knew what a Barbie doll was.

The ever-watchful Tama silently noted Aki's problem with her new attire and instantly moved to fix the problem. Of course everybody else's attention was chained to the particularly obnoxious Hanako.

"I knew you'd be here when I heard who you'd been left with," Hanako still hadn't stopped talking yet. "It's indecent I say, but I wasn't there and Fred is less than helpful and everyone else was more likely to increase your danger I suppose It's not to be help. At least I knew where you'd end up which I wouldn't if they'd left you with Kikyou. No knowing where she would've gone…"

Just as Aki was about to pass out from lack of Oxygen Tama reentered the room and briskly hauled Aki out of the suffocating shirt. Then, after everybody had gotten an eyeful, she garbed the female in one of Sesshoumaru's spares.

Aki was so incredibly mortified that her oxygen-starved body couldn't support further conscious thought and she fainted into Tama's arms.

Hanako had instantly stopped talking with her mouth hanging open and a chilling gleam in her eye. Sesshoumaru had a similar gleam in his eye and poor Fred had the ghost's equivalent of a bloody nose. Exposing Aki probably wasn't the greatest thing Tama could've done.

"Give her here you old goat!" Hanako demanded, wary of allowing her favorite person to remain in the hands of someone that had caused her to faint. It was amazing just how much Hanako could see and yet not understand.

"Why? So you can suffocate her some more?" Tama refused.

"No," Hanako replied grandly. "So that the fragile invalid can feel the warmth and security of my true and passionate love."

"Hanako," Fred groaned, he'd hoped the demon bunny might have toned it down a bit over time. Sesshoumaru and Tama, who had not previously been exposed to Hanako's special insanity, openly stared at the ridiculous creature they now found themselves meeting.

Sesshoumaru recovered himself first. "The only person who has any right to make claims of that sort upon Aki, is me," he stated smoothly. And Hanako went ballistic.

It was too loud in the small space and Aki began to stir. Tama shifted her burden slightly and silently huffed with exasperation. This Aki person, so new to her care, needed rest and quiet. Something she obviously wasn't going to get in here with everyone making demands of her.

Truly Tama Hadn't thought Sesshoumaru would be as bad as he was demonstrating and she certainly hadn't known anything about Hanako. Still, the girl was her responsibility and as such the matron would ensure a full recovery, even if she had to piss off her lord to do it. He had ordered her to look after the female after all.

Tama clenched her jaw in firm resolution and lifted Aki completely into her arms. Then the chatelaine headed directly for the outer door.

"Hey you old goat!" Hanako challenged the elder female. "Where are you taking my Aki!" Sesshoumaru likewise demanded an answer of his servant, albeit a bit more quietly.

"Aki needs rest and quiet," Tama began darkly. "I'm going to make sure she gets it even if I have to protect her from you!" she glared at Sesshoumaru. "I am determined to follow my orders the way I always have."

Sesshoumaru blinked in confusion. He couldn't remember the exact orders he had issued upon his arrival, nor could he remember the order in which they'd been given, but he was beginning to wish he could because he could see pain in his near future because of them.

"Tama." He said quietly. Only someone who'd raised him would detect the barest hint of desperate fear in his tone, begging her not to take Aki from him.

Tama looked at him before turning swiftly and quickly sweeping out the door into the hallway. On her way down the hall she collected Rin, it wouldn't do to leave a small defenseless child in the path of an enraged demon lord. A few doors down Tama stopped and entered the room there marked before swiftly erecting on of her legendary barriers.

Sesshoumaru lost control the second Aki vanished from his sight. With a roar he threw himself into the hall after the servant bearing his mate. Unfortunately Tama proved to be just as fast now as she always had been when he was a child. There was no sign of where they had gone.

He could not track them by scent. Tama's scent was thick within his estate from her constant movement within it and Aki's scent, if he had actually known it, would've been easily buried in the thoroughfare of the hallway. He had to calm down slightly to attempt other methods of tracking.

Hanako's hysteria had demolished any trace of air current that might have been left by Tama's swift passage. Her constant motion and incessant noise grated on the inu youkai's frayed nerves until he finally clobbered the hyper bunny. While knocking her unconscious didn't repair the obliterated clues or make Aki's scent easier to find, it did make him feel slightly better.

"Effective stress reliever isn't it?" Fred commented quietly. He'd wanted to clobber Hanako for ages. Being a ghost made it impossible for him to do.

"You just wish you could do the same," Sesshoumaru replied absently.

"You're damn right I do!" Fred sighed. "And Aki won't lay a hand on anyone who doesn't offer violence first."

Sesshoumaru felt a bit self-conscious at that. He wasn't one to wait for an attack to come. What would Aki think about that? Best not to think of it and keep his mind on the task before him.

He'd eliminated scent and air movement, what else could he use to find Aki? He glanced over at the still unconscious Hanako. No way would he ask her for help, she'd probably leave him behind as a rival for Aki's attention. That left Fred. Like Fred would be helpful.

However, at this point Sesshoumaru was willing to try almost anything, anything being Fred. "Can you find her?" he asked the ghost.

"Can I find her?" Fred asked mockingly. "How could I not? She's my frigging anchor. She's what holds me to the living world. Can I find her?" he scoffed. Fred vanished. He expected to go POOF right where Aki was, but there was something in the way. "What the hell is this?" the ghost demanded as he reappeared right outside of a door, drawing Sesshoumaru's attention. "I can't get through."

Sesshoumaru studied the door carefully. Tama's barriers had always been known for their strength and resilience. Now she'd proven able to block out ghosts. Not that it helped his cause any. He wanted to be where Aki was, and Aki was on the wrong side of this barrier.

Sesshoumaru's control slipped again and he proceeded to test the resilience of this particular barrier.

Tama was rather annoyed by the racket. Aki needed quiet and that constant banging wasn't helping. Impulsively she sent a surge of power across the surface of her barrier and zapped the youkai banding so inconsiderately against the door.

Aki was still unconscious, tucked safe and warm in the rather large futon this particular room sported. Rin had taken one look at Aki's pale face and crawled right in to snuggle next to the larger female. The two were snuggled together at the moment and wholly unaware of just what insanity was going on in the hall.

Tama gazed down at them and chuckled. "Sesshoumaru-sama," she whispered to the somewhat stale air, "you're a strange one. You pick out your children before you pick out your mate."

Tama tucked the girls in a bit more securely before clucking to herself. This room wasn't quite as well cared for as the lord's and it could use a little work before either girl awoke. Sesshoumaru would have her head if he knew the state of this room. Normally he might not care, but she suspected he would want to give Aki the best impression of his home and nothing less. The old housekeeper sighed and set to work.


	11. Gravity Works

Heheh, and we come to the conclusion of part two. Just about eveybody's in this chapter, including Kouga. And a fun new detachment of Naraku's, one that never gets a name because a nameless evil is more scary... or not, maybe I was just lazy and couldn't think of a name, who knows?

Next week we start another part of this story, one where even more weird stuff happens, and new characters pop up all over the place. Aki gets really pissed off, but is too tired to really do anything. Really, she should take better care of herself! As Sesshoumaru can't help but get angry over her disregard for her health. It's a good thing he's got a healthy ego though, because it takes a bit of a beating. but that doesn't come until later.

Rumiko TAkahashi's characters are threatening to strike again. For some reason they don't like that they can't even findpeace in their sleep.

**Gravity Works**

Aki's tired mind slogged through the dream slowly. Her eyes opened by small increments at a time in attempts to adjust to the light that surround her. It was so bright! Suddenly her eyes widened with surprise, this was certainly a strange dream. The dream was white.

_From the wide spread sky to the powder covering the ground, everything was white, and she hated it. But strangely the ground covering of snow is what puzzled and freaked her out most._

_Aki never dreamed of snow. Actually she never dreamed of different kinds of weather, but snow would've been the last that she would dream. She hated snow. It was cold and wet and worst of all, white. But this snow was warm and dry and really weird. It was still a terrible whiteness and should not have been in her dream._

_Worse than the whiteness was the empty horizon. Everywhere she looked there was nothing. No one was to be found._

_After the deaths of Aki's family members she had developed a terrible fear of being alone. Her ten-month quarantine had only agitated it until she was virtually crippled by it. _

_When she was awake she could push it aside, Fred's constant company and the basic knowledge that when she was alone all she had to do was stand still a few minutes and he would suddenly appear had helped her keep her fears to herself. But in a dream…_

_In her previous nightmares the fear wasn't so pronounced because she was relieving the events that had birthed it. There were other things to pay attention to instead of the intense feeling of being the only living person in them. But this, emptiness…_

_Aki shook herself. This was her dream Damnit! She would find someone or something that wasn't deplorably white and empty._

_She began to walk, spiraling out from where she started, in search of something that wasn't snow and sky._

_As will eventually happen in a dream the dreamer is working to change, she managed to find what she was looking for. There! She smiled with relief and glee as she spotted a shimmering image across the dreamscape. She forced herself to believe that it truly was there, that it was real. If she believed something in her dream, then it would be because this was her mind. _

_Aki trekked towards the image, willing herself closer, willing something to be there. She fought herself to believe it, fought to keep her fear from breaking the image. _

_Finally she stood close enough to see it clearly. It was like a transparent bubble on the sea of snow. Inside it held a darkness that she knew meant pain for her, but the bubble also held Fred. Stabbing her hand through the barrier before she could disbelieve it she grasped Fred's arm and pulled him through to her side._

_"Aki!" he gasped out in awe and worry. "I was scared when I couldn't get through."_

_Aki merely nodded at him, the rest of her fear finally dissolving. She wasn't alone. Fred was here; Fred would always be here._

_"When Tama threw up that barrier and neither of us could get through I didn't know what to do." She'd missed some of what he said, but that was all right. It was a dream and she wasn't alone. She smiled softly, that was all that mattered to her._

_Fred suddenly realized something. Aki had grabbed a hold of him without passing through his arm because he was a ghost. He dazedly came to understand that this was a dream and since ghosts don't dream, this was Aki's dream. He pushed that thought aside. It didn't really matter whose dream it was, all that mattered was that she could touch him, which meant that he could touch her back. Fred grabbed up his best friend and hugged her tightly the way he wished he could since the day he'd died. "Dear god, Aki, it's been too long since I could do this!" he exclaimed holding her still tighter in his arms. _

_It was during his almost desperate hug that he got his first glimpse of the dream beyond where he'd where she'd pulled him. It was white, a vast white space apparently devoid of anything else. No wonder she'd pulled him into her dream._

_Aki's experiences with her curse had left her terrified of sterile white spaces and filled with a profound loneliness that bordered on terror. He suspected that if she was capable of finding and establishing a new circle of friends she'd quickly be able to usurp the very foundations of these fears, but she couldn't and that left her terribly vulnerable but too stubborn to allow fear to rule her._

_But all that had no bearing on what was happening in the here and now, Aki had drawn him into her dream to combat her fears and she very likely hadn't really heard anything he had said right afterwards. That was all right, he supposed. He'd promised to be there for her and so he would._

_Aki drew slightly away from him to gaze blankly into his face. She was probably surprised by his actions. He'd never been the touchy feely type when he was alive, but this was different from then and he dragged her back into a tight hug._

Somewhere else in Japan where the people don't sleep in the middle of the day, Inuyasha and company were doggedly searching for more Shikon no Kakera. At least they were until a sudden undeniable wave of exhaustion swept over the group.

"Inuyasha," Kagome began, fighting to keep from falling asleep on her feet. "Let's take a break."

"Feh," groaned Inuyasha, likewise trying to keep from passing out. "You weak humans! If you keep this u we'll never find the shards!" Far be it from him to own up to his own fatigue.

"You're right," Sango said, making Inuyasha suspicious. The girls never agreed so easily, there had to be something more to it. "However, the process would be even more greatly slowed if we all took ill or died from exhaustion."

"Feh!" He knew it! Everyone settled for a rest as Inuyasha looked on in frustration. It didn't escape his notice that everyone truly did look fatigued, even Miroku who was too tired to grope Sango. This was odd; they hadn't done anything recently to cause everyone to be so tired. Inuyasha nearly split his head with a sudden yawn as these thoughts quietly spiraled into slumber with him.

_"Damn," Inuyasha growled with annoyance._

_"Inuyasha,' Kagome called from somewhere to his left._

_"Over here," he replied gruffly and swore again. It was so damned dark in here._

_A slap rang out in the dark. "Sounds like Miroku and Sango are here too," Kagome murmured as she drew up along side of him. "I wonder why they're all in my dream?"_

_"Your dream?" Inuyasha snorted. "This is my dream you're all butting in on!"_

_"Nonsense! I was here first!" Shippou declared fiercely._

_"No way, this is my dream." Miroku replied dreamily, his smirk clearly translated into his tone._

_"Silence, This is none of our dreams," a deep controlled voice stated._

_Inuyasha's eye twitched, "Sesshoumaru what are you doing here!" he demanded._

_"I could ask the same of you, Dog Terd!" yet another voice hollered._

_"Be quiet!" a cold feminine voice hushed the others._

_A body moved in the dark and suddenly light flashed over them._

_"How pretty!" Shippou breathed after his eyes adjusted. The image beyond the edge of their collective darkness was quite breathtaking in it's beauty._

_Sesshoumaru moved towards the distant light, partially blocking it from the others as he walked. The others decided to follow him for lack of anything better to do. They needed to get this strange dream figured out and most would feel better about doing this where there was light to see by._

_Gradually they found that the previously small window of light wasn't. By the time they stood directly in front of this lighted image the bottom of it rested near their feet and the top loomed far over their heads._

_"Geez, It's like a cheap snow globe souvenir!" Kagome muttered. They were finally close enough to discern more than just the light, and what they saw was snow. But it was too large and the snow fell to realistic for it to be a snow globe for real._

_Distantly one could make out two figures amidst all the white. "Sesshoumaru-sama," Rin began quietly. "What are they doing?"_

_"They look like they're hugging," Kagome ventured to answer the question. "In some countries Hugging is more common than here. They must be friends, or family or something." It was the "or something" that had Sesshoumaru's eyes seeing red._

_Inuyasha reached out a hand to test the surface of the image that moved. It might be like the tell-a-viz-on thing in Kagome's time. Instead of just stopping him from entering the image, the surface zapped him, to ward him off._

_"A barrier," Kikyou's calm, dry voice stated._

_"Indeed, my barrier," came a strange female voice with the raspy-ness of age. "Though I wonder how he got in there."_

_"Tama," Sesshoumaru growled, still peeved at the chatelaine._

_"Hush," Tama turned to watch the two figures framed by the light. Her actions drew all eyes back to the dream playing out before them. _

_The two figures were no longer quite so close to each other. In fact, they were quite far apart and throwing things at each other. The redheaded figure of the person closest to them had his back to them and the fair-haired female was too far away to see her expression. Even from this great a distance they could recognize her, though._

_"Sesshoumaru-sama, Rin wants to play too,' the little girl tugged at Sesshoumaru's sleeve. He looked down at her quietly, nearly missing when a giant snowball nailed the redhead, sending him to fall back through the barrier. He quickly got to his feet, untangling himself for Miroku, Sango and Kirara who had kindly broken his fall._

_The redhead attempted to walk back through the barrier and found that he couldn't. He pounded his fist against it, making it crackle._

_"Stop that!" Tama yelled in annoyance._

_The redhead ignored her and kept pounding to no avail. He pressed both hands against the barrier and desperately searched for a way through by touch._

_Aki had let one more snowball loose before realizing that there weren't anymore coming her way. The perfectly pack snowball sailed easily through the barrier and hit the male plastered up against it. The ball exploded on his shoulder and snow flew everywhere._

_"Huh! That was cold!" the redhead sputtered. Kagome narrowed her eyes at him; his voice was awfully familiar._

_"Baka!" Inuyasha spat. "Of course it's cold, it's snow!"_

_The redhead glared at him, "It wasn't in there. It was warm and dry!"_

_"No way!" Kagome finally placed his voice. "You can't be him!" Everybody stared at her in startle-ment._

_"What are you babbling about, wench?" Inuyasha growled._

_"You're Fred!" Kagome stated incredulously. It was quite surprising to find the normally very gray ghost had red hair. None of them had recognized him. Everyone was so surprised by Kagome's revelation that they all turned to study Fred, leaving nobody to really pay attention to Aki._

_No one saw how the snow suddenly stopped falling. No one noticed when the sun came out. No one witnessed the fear that flit across Aki's features when she realized that Fred had left their game. She clenched her hands and strode determinedly forward. _

_When Fred turned back to the barrier he found his friend just on the other side of it. "Come on, pull me through again," Fred muttered softly. Aki reached her hand out certain it would pass to the other side._

_Her eyes widened in surprise when she crashed into the barrier instead of slipping through. She couldn't pass it. She couldn't reach him. Her eyes swept across the barrier and realized that the other side was filled with people she knew._

"_Why can't she get through?" Fred's own eyes were wide with shock. "She pulled me through before."_

"_Nonsense!" Tama huffed insulted. She'd never allow her barrier to be so flimsy._

_They all looked up as movement from the other side drew their attention. "What is she going to do?" Miroku asked feeling sick with dread. He just knew he wasn't going to like this._

_Aki had gotten herself a running start and now shot forward to slam into the barrier. She sat stunned for a moment as the stars rang through her skull. Then she got back up to give it another go. She hit it again but not even the sound of impact made it through the barrier. She was determined to break through; she would never be locked in anything like a rat in a cage again! When she ran at the barrier again, something broke leaving blood smeared on the surface of the barrier._

"_Aki, please stop!' Fred whimpered as she hit the barrier again and slid down it._

"_Tama," Sesshoumaru growled the name. He refused to watch Aki hurt herself._

"_I already took it down," Tama said with alarm. "I don't know what's keeping her in now." Sesshoumaru looked at her with disbelief._

"_What?" Inuyasha hollered. Seeing girls beat themselves against walls was not his favorite pastime. Seeing them cry while they did so, he liked even less._

_Fred set to beating on the barrier again. It didn't even crackle like it did before. Aki picked herself up again. "No! Aki don't do it again!" he practically begged. Then he set to beating on the barrier even more forcefully than he had before. Very shortly Sesshoumaru, Inuyasha, Miroku, and even Kouga joined him._

_None of them desired to see her any bloodier than she already was. "I thought this was a dream," Sango thought aloud. "How can she hurt herself in a dream?"_

_Fred grunted, "It's her dream. Any wounds she incurs here won't appear physically in reality, but they are real and she can die here, in a dream."_

"_What about us?" Kagome asked._

"_What about you?" Fred demanded, "This isn't your dream, it's hers. She would never allow any real or permanent damage to happen to you while you're here."_

_The boys paused, breathing heavily from effort. "Look!" Shippou shouted. Every one turned to see the green bleed out of the irises of Aki's eyes to stain the whites. Her pupils flashed amber under the light of the dreamscape sun._

_The snow began to fly, kicked up by the sudden youki that ballooned around her powerfully. With a roar that they couldn't hear she threw her youki at the barrier. Her body impacted against the invisible wall just after the blast and the barrier shattered like glass, tearing at her clothing and cutting her skin._

Aki's momentum carried her slightly past the crowd before she slid to the ground breathing heavily from effort and pain. She whirled around quickly as she sensed something back in the snow.

_Standing in the path of disturbed snow stood a figure with a scowling painted face. "So you broke through it, did you?" his gravelly voice barked out. "Seems I've underestimated you."_

"_Who are you!" Aki demanded, her voice low and strained. The demon in her made her voice deeper and more husky. The sound effected Sesshoumaru in strange and interesting ways._

"_My name is unimportant," he grated, "Yours is the one I'm after." Her eyes narrowed at him, blatantly ignoring all the people around her._

_Aki laughed darkly, Naraku thought he could find her name through this painted-monkey of a detachment? "Ah, Naraku," she chuckled, a low sinister sound at the base of her throat. "He thinks my name would be so easy to find that he could merely attack me in dreaming with nothing but a detachment!" She laughed again, a sound bordering on madness. "The fool!"_

"_Indeed, little princess," he growled in return, "and yet this nothing detachment has already learned your greatest fears."_

"_Have you really? And you think to use this against me?" she mused laughingly._

"_No, you can not be controlled by your fear." The painted lines on his face creased with his smile. If he were not so leashed to Naraku, the things he would do to this female. He leered wickedly, packing heat in his glance._

_Aki glared at the painted face with disgust. This was her dream Damnit! She would decide what happened. This detachment had attempted to take control away from her. Well she would take it back! "I think, Mr. Make-up man," she growled with humor, "that it's a little too crowded in here." And with that everyone else vanished from the dream._

"Where the hell are we!" Inuyasha demanded.

"You're in your family's house," Tama answered dryly. "Surely you can still recognize your father's home."

Everyone had awakened suddenly to find themselves in a rather large room sprawled across the floor. Amazingly enough, despite the size of the futon, only Shippou and Rin had managed to land there next to Aki's unconscious body.

"Kagome!" Shippou cried worriedly. "There's something wrong with Aki!"

Kagome raced Kikyou and Tama over to the bed, though Sesshoumaru beat them all to it. "Her fever has returned," He informed them blandly. "And her breathing appears to be restricted by something."

"Hey, Sesshoumaru, you bastard! What's she doing wearing your shirt!" Inuyasha noted a peculiar expression dart across his half siblings face at his words.

"Maybe he's claimed her as his woman!" Kouga suggested. "In which case you'd best keep your paws off of her as well as my Kagome!"

The door of the room snapped open and the devil incarnate stood before them. Or rather, Hanako did, but she was much like keeping company with devils. "No way! Aki's mine!" she bellowed, staking her claim firmly.

Kouga was unfamiliar with the rabbit youkai's behavior. Her strange declaration left him unable to do more than stare at her energetic insanity.

Miroku and Inuyasha just groaned. Hopefully something would distract the demon rabbit before she could launch into her theories as to the why's and how's of her version of the purest love of girls with girls. She could be quite graphic and just a bit disgusting.

Aki's eyes snapped open. She'd broken the dream, but she couldn't breath. Air, she needed Air.

Aki got up, brushing off Kagome, Kikyou and the kids like they weren't there. Her eyes were open and normal looking, but they showed no recognition of what was before her. Even when Hanako began to chant directions with a happy glee only the obsessed can contain she blatantly ignored the other occupants of the room. The window, she needed to get to the window.

She tripped on the end of Miroku's staff just as she neared her goal, and instead of stopping at the window, she plunged head first through it and over the edge of the cliff.

"Aki!" there was a mad rush for the window, all too late.

She was falling, but she was finally able to breath. Her eyes quickly assessed her situation. The ground was eagerly rising up to meet her. She couldn't figure out how she could have fallen. She wasn't that close to the window. Someone had pushed her.

Suddenly she glimpsed the answer. Naraku's newest detachment was waiting at the bottom of the cliff, ready to catch her up. Aki judged that if she opened her wings now she'd be able to clear him without touching. Touching that bastard seemed like a rather bad idea at the moment.

She managed to clear him with a snap of her wings, but didn't manage to clear the trees beyond him. Aki clipped one wing and her wrist. Pain exploded up her arm to coalesce with the pain from her wing in her shoulder.

It was so intense she almost didn't feel her body jar as it hit the ground and tumbled down hill before coming to a bloody stop when she hit her head on a rock. Unconsciousness snaked up to claim her before thought had a chance to assert itself.

And that's how Sesshoumaru found her. The taiyoukai had leapt out the window after her almost as soon as she cleared it. He'd seen the detachment waiting to steal her away and it enraged him to think he'd nearly lost his mate because of him. He had then been forced to watch as Aki fell to the ground, dread knotting in his stomach.

He was so afraid when he found her unconscious. She lay there like death. Sesshoumaru bent to shake her. He needed her conscious. She blinked up at him; her eyes empty of all things except the reflection of what was outside of them.

Sesshoumaru scooped her up and planted a burning kiss of relief on her precious lips. It was difficult to end the kiss. His body didn't want to let go. His youkai remembered the sound of her voice in the dream and wanted pursue the feelings it had tugged in him. But he forced himself to end the kiss. He needed to get Aki to safer ground, preferably back inside the protected grounds of his estate.

Sesshoumaru checked her over as he carried her back up the cliff. Aki was in bad shape. It was worse that she hadn't managed to fully recover from her previous injuries.

Sesshoumaru sighed grumpily. The longer she took to heal, the longer he had to wait before Tama would let him have her again. Unless there was some way to help her heal faster. He paused.

There was one way to do it. If Tama caught him, she would give him hell for it. But Tama was no longer his nanny. And Tama wasn't his mate. The inu youkai's golden eyes harden with decision. It was settled.

Sesshoumaru entered his home and disappeared inside the first room that didn't open onto the cliff. It was dusty with minor neglect, but it would serve his purpose. And the dust suggested this room wouldn't be checked right away giving him time to do what he planned.

He rolled out the disused futon and set down his precious burden, careful to straighten the feathers on her wings so that they rested comfortably. Then he crawled carefully over her to hover above her reclining body.

Aki blinked emerald eyes at him questioningly. Sesshoumaru allowed a small comforting smile to curve his firm mouth. "This may hurt at first," he began in a deep voice, "but it will help you heal." He warned her. He lowered his face until his hot breath misted against the side of her throat.

He hated that necessity forced him to mark her. He hated that a detachment of Naraku had shoved him into advancing the level of their mating contract. Truthfully he didn't mind ascending to the second level-mating contract, he just hated having his actions dictated by others. Especially when they threw a shadow over such important decisions. But it couldn't be helped.

Sesshoumaru drew in one last deep breath, inhaling the vanilla and lavender of her soap and something deeper nearly hidden beneath the perfume and his own scent, sank his teeth into the soft flesh just above her collarbone.

Aki gasped in surprise before her eyes lost what little focus they had previously contained. He showed her how to heal her various wound then supplied her with the energy to do so. Her body greedily accepted his strength and ran with it. By the time Tama and the other found them, the deed was done.

"Sesshoumaru!" Tama yelled in anger. The others crowded behind her silently stunned. "What have you done now!"

Sesshoumaru rubbed his cheek against Aki's jaw before turning tired eyes to the crowd assembled at the door. He didn't say anything, Aki's injuries had left him feeling terribly drained and tired.

"Damn! I was right!" Kouga exclaimed in shock, referring to his earlier comments.

"Sesshoumaru," Tama's raised voice was filled with firm command and he flinched with the memory of what it used to mean. "Get off her, right now!"

Sesshoumaru sighed tiredly and moved to comply. He pushed straight up off of Aki's warm body and gasped as his limbs shook with fatigue. He was nearly as drained as Aki was.

The female under him creased her brow in confusion. She'd been so warm a moment ago. Why was someone trying to steal her blanket? Aki reached up her arms to wrap around her "blanket" sleepily. When the "blanket" refused to obey the law of gravity, she bit her lip and pulled.

Sesshoumaru cried out in insuppressible surprise and collapsed back down onto Aki. Then he smiled ruefully at his former nanny before settling his head on Aki's shoulder. If she wanted him there, who was he to argue?

This was the exact moment that Hanako entered the room. Oh she did not like seeing Sesshoumaru lying on top of her Aki, not at all! "Hey you! Get your paws off my Aki!" she growled. It was a less than terrifying threat coming from a rabbit youkai no bigger than a human eleven year old.

Sesshoumaru just looked at her tiredly. He was too drained to move again. Besides Aki would just drag him back down again anyway, not that he minded.

Hanako, of course, misinterpreted the look as a challenge and launched herself at him, making to strike the insolent (in her opinion) inu youkai. The outraged bunny youkai failed to realize that in striking out at her target she very likely would strike Aki in her rage.

Sesshoumaru's heart clenched in fear as he watched the enraged demon attack. He was too drained to block Hanako's attack and Tama wouldn't intercept the threat in time. Any other day of his rather long life, this would not have caused him fear. Not today, when Aki was also likely to be injured by the blow. Especially not after he'd just put her back together.

Inuyasha and Kouga bolted towards the fight playing out before them. The dog boy readied for a strike almost as an after thought. It didn't matter to him if Sesshoumaru came to harm, but he rather liked Aki and had already claimed her as family. He was definitely not about to let something happen to her.

There was no reason for Kouga to jump in. Maybe he just felt like jumping into the fray. Maybe he didn't want to be left out of a possible fight. Maybe he just didn't like Hanako. Who knows?

Anyways, they were in mid-intercept when Hanako bounced off of some invisible thing and fell back into everyone trying to stop her. The room became incredibly quiet.

"Tama, please tell me that's one of yours," InuYasha murmured, eyes wide as he rubbed his cheek where Hanako's claws had scored it.

"Afraid not," Tama grumped, worriedly probing the bruise forming on her back where she fell.

"If it's not yours…" he mumbled with trepidation.

"It's not his either, look!" Miroku observed pointing in the direction of the invisible barrier. In unison everyone turned to see a very stunned Sesshoumaru looking down at the green-eyed amber-pupiled creature glaring at Hanako.

"Aki did it?" Kagome gasped. "I thought she was unconscious and exhausted."

As if to reinforce Kagome's observation, the shield visibly winked out of existence, as the aforementioned female seemed to collapse in on herself, closing her slowly changing eyes. The room was quiet for on long stunned moment, just enough time for a very tired and drained taiyoukai to join his mate in Exhausted delirium.

Slowly everyone retrieved their jaws from the floor and filtered out of the room until only Kagome and Inuyasha were left to stare at the pair of sleepers. Silently they came to the same decision to "help" the sleeping couple.


End file.
